Week 6: The big freeze
Monday’s training session was again marked out by the terrible frost and ice we’ve been having in Scarborough lately. It wasn’t as bad as yesterday, but it was still bad enough to call conditions treacherous.
The steps outside my front door were still covered in black ice, which made even walking a few steps risky. I managed to make it down to my usual starting point without falling over and was able to continue with my plan of 5 miles at easy pace. The ice did force me to run on the opposite side of the road whilst going around the headland, as there was just too much black ice on the promenade to be able to concentrate on running over it.
Once again I also had to slow down to walking pace at some points as well due to the hazardous conditions. When I was able to run on the beaches of the South and North Bay, this was a welcome relief to scanning the footpaths for patches of ice and frost.
The tide had gone quite far out on Monday, which meant I could run almost the entire length of the North Bay beach. It afforded some fantastic views of the cliffs and the castle and it also reminded me how much I enjoy running close to the sea. I did have to skip my planned 4×10 second hill starts, as the roads were just too icy to do any kind of speed work. Hopefully the weather will thaw out a bit over the week and make training a little easier.
Moving on to Wednesday. It was still treacherous, but not too bad on the sea front, where the crashing of waves onto the promenade appears to have stopped ice from forming. I did my usual Tuesday work-out today instead in the hope that the weather might be thawing out, however, it obviously wasn’t going to improve any time soon.I think the going was made a bit harder by the fact that my MP3 player had developed a fault which meant I couldn’t charge it, which in turn meant that it died just five minutes after I set off.
Whilst running along outside the Sands apartments, I met Nick, who works at the same company as me. This was the first time I believe I’ve met another colleague on a morning ruin, possibly because of how early I usually go running. Anyway, he was walking his dogs and called me over just as I was about to run past him. Now I do have reason to believe that nick went out deliberately to spot me because since he learnt that I’m a runner, he has reacted with a sense of incredulous disbelief and wants to know my route in detail. Or maybe I’m just being paranoid.
Well, the fact I was chatting to him gave me the opportunity to rest from what was a fairly intense 3-mile moderate section of a five mile run. Also, I had planned to do my 4×10 hill starts today, but Nick foiled my plans by stealing my time!
On Friday, once again I looked out the window at about 5:30am and decided that the conditions would be too treacherous. However, as the day progressed, there was a thaw in the freezing conditions, so I decided that I would go out after work.
What surprised me about going for a run in the evening was how certain things were easier – doing my warm-ups, I felt far more flexible and limber and whilst running the first two miles, I didn’t feel the shocking aches and pains in my muscles or feet that I usually get when running in the morning.
It was a bit of a rough night for the sea, and it was breaking over the railings of the North Bay promenade in spectacular fashion. So much so that I decided to run on the opposite side of the road, if only to stay dry and out of the waves. when I hit the section of the North Bay lined with beach huts, past The Sands apartments, I ran along the top of the sea wall for the first time, alongside the beach huts themselves in order to stay out of the water. the sea was regularly crashing over this section of my route, making it otherwise impassable.
Not for the first time, I also had to run through the crazy-golf course near the Sea Life Centre because of the rough seas. This section of my run seemed more like an assault rather than the five miles at easy pace that my schedule dictated. I doubled back on myself after that, all the way back to where I started and completed my run by doing four laps around the headland (about a mile each). This was much more pleasant as there wasn’t too strong a wind and even though the seas were quite rough, they weren’t breaking over these sea walls tonight – not to mention the fact that there was much better lighting around the headland.
I concluded the final lap with 6×30 second fartlek intervals at roughly 5k pace, then a sprint finish. I was feeling quite pleased with myself that I had done this training session, and at night, that I finished by finally doing the 4×10 second hill starts that I had been putting off since Monday.