January 17, 2005
Almost Froze My Gizzard
It was a fascinating experience for me in my first timed run, other than when I ran cross-country eons ago in high school. Driving into Fort Frances, I had to remind myself several times, "It's only a 5K run. You've done this before, and you've done longer in colder weather. Relax." I felt pretty wound up, nonetheless.
When I got the Rainy River Community College, where the race started and finished, and went in to register, I was staggered by the number of participants. There were about 58 people registered for the 5K, but over 120 running the 10K. I hooked up with Bob Tkachuk, who's a marathon runner from Fort Frances, and we chatted while I got my tag (runner #60) and my bag o' crap from the sponsors. The sense of cameraderie was palpable in the room. We all were there to run versus the elements, and the friendly competitiveness was pretty low-key. As the cold constricts your blood vessels, so it also seemed with the participants. It was ironic to see how the caste system existed, however -- you'd meet someone, shake hands, and look at their pinned-on tag, to see if they were running the 5K or 10K.
After stretching and warming up, they called out the 5K participants to the starting area. It involved going outside, across a courtyard, and in another set of doors -- and then down a long hallway, that seemed more like part of an airport than a college, with doors and windows on both sides. I kept waiting to find a Mesaba Air Dash-8 parked outside.
At the starting line, they had starting guns. That's right, guns. Rifles, actually, in true Lake of the Woods-area fashion -- three guys with .308 rifles and hunting caps, waiting to start the race. It felt like a bizarre, backwoods salute -- or maybe they were there as motivation for the runners. Either way, it humoured the hell out of me.
The run was fun, mostly. In point form, my observations:
I successfully finished the 5K Freeze Your Gizzard Blizzard Run on Saturday. Time? 32:06, which is almost bang-on my indoor pace of 6km/h, and faster than my outdoor pace has been, usually (about 5-ish). I was 19th out of 58 participants.
It was a fascinating experience for me in my first timed run, other than when I ran cross-country eons ago in high school. Driving into Fort Frances, I had to remind myself several times, "It's only a 5K run. You've done this before, and you've done longer in colder weather. Relax." I felt pretty wound up, nonetheless.
When I got the Rainy River Community College, where the race started and finished, and went in to register, I was staggered by the number of participants. There were about 58 people registered for the 5K, but over 120 running the 10K. I hooked up with Bob Tkachuk, who's a marathon runner from Fort Frances, and we chatted while I got my tag (runner #60) and my bag o' crap from the sponsors. The sense of cameraderie was palpable in the room. We all were there to run versus the elements, and the friendly competitiveness was pretty low-key. As the cold constricts your blood vessels, so it also seemed with the participants. It was ironic to see how the caste system existed, however -- you'd meet someone, shake hands, and look at their pinned-on tag, to see if they were running the 5K or 10K.
After stretching and warming up, they called out the 5K participants to the starting area. It involved going outside, across a courtyard, and in another set of doors -- and then down a long hallway, that seemed more like part of an airport than a college, with doors and windows on both sides. I kept waiting to find a Mesaba Air Dash-8 parked outside.
At the starting line, they had starting guns. That's right, guns. Rifles, actually, in true Lake of the Woods-area fashion -- three guys with .308 rifles and hunting caps, waiting to start the race. It felt like a bizarre, backwoods salute -- or maybe they were there as motivation for the runners. Either way, it humoured the hell out of me.
The run was fun, mostly. In point form, my observations:
- Thank jeebus for packing two balaclavas -- especially when it turns out I only packed one, leaving the other on the floor at home.
- Plug the headphones in on the iPod *before* the guns go off. That way, you're not the last one to leave.
- Wear the iPod closer to the body thank under the windjacket, so the battery doesn't die fifteen minutes in from exposure.
- It would be useful to have sunglasses made out of copper or some other highly-conductive metal, so that the lenses could be defrosted by your own body heat. I ran the last 700 metres with my head tilted back, because my lenses were so frosted up.
- Aggressive-tread shoes rule on packed-snow roads.
