Will I ever get used to these harsh northern winters...?

I've lived in West and South Yorkshire for 9 years now and every winter John will hear me say the same thing, "it's so cold up here, it was never this cold in Dorset I hardly ever had to wear gloves...".  But it is so cold up here!  I was brought up in the biting winters of South Wales, but I got soft when I moved in my late teens to balmy Dorset, well in my opinion compared to Wales and Yorkshire it is balmy!

Anyhow, this week has been a challenge to run with the icy conditions.  I enjoy running in virgin snow, which is wonderfully soft and invigorating, but as soon as other humans and their dogs and their bikes and their sleighs have trampled over it the surface becomes a runner's enemy.  Then add in the dark, as it's the only time you get to run in the working week and the wind, sleet and hail that lashes your already freezing face the challenge to put your trainers on and head out the door is most definitely increased!  A non runner reading this will be thinking this running malarkey sounds so awful...It's not, honest!

I tried hard all week to overcome the weather barriers as I remembered my renewed enthusiasm in the Christmas holidays and I can proudly say it mostly worked, until Thursday when the tiredness of work and the conditions put paid to my running streak that I'd inadvertently started on December 21st.  Oh well I didn't quite make the whole month without a rest day, but I have increased the training significantly in the last month going from 25-30 miles to 61, 71, 70 and as this week was an intentional cutback week of 50 miles I felt okay with myself for having that rest day.

Okay so what has this week looked like?  Nothing too spectacular about my running, no fancy sessions or structured hard running yet, just all easy and steady miles to increase strength and aerobic base.  Build that mitochondria for a natural pace increase before adding in some specific sessions.  So Monday to Friday was mostly slow to steady miles around 8:30 - 9:00/mi.  Saying that the underfoot conditions wouldn't allow for much more!  Saturday parkrun is the only run I work a little harder if the legs allow.

This week we headed to Clumber parkrun as we know this event is always one you can run when conditions are testing elsewhere.  On warming up my legs felt heavy, probably from doing 8 miles the day before, I'm still not recovering from runs very quickly, but decided just to run to feel and if I felt like pushing then do so and if not then don't bother.  I set off a little faster than I normally would, but realised that I wouldn't be able to continue that pace, so eased off slightly to what felt comfortably hard and kept it that way for the whole run except I really pushed up the last little hill to see how the legs responded and I was surprised to feel a renewed strength I've not felt for a while, so that little hill gave me a small sign of progress.  The overall pace was 7:18 on MT, but very firm trail paths, so is worth around 40 seconds, which would've put that run around 21:30 on a flat tarmac course.  Still a way to go to secure a sub 20 5k again...

Sunday was to be the longest run John and I had done for many months, but the underfoot conditions in Penistone were still pretty bad and I really couldn't face 18 miles up and down the TPT this week, so we met Simon, who has been a loyal training partner for the last 11 years for me and about 20 years for John, and off we trotted down the TPT from Silkstone to the trails, woods and roads of Barnsley.  John is pretty good at making up routes that just seem to measure the exact distance, no Map My Run Apps needed for this man, he has his own inbuilt measuring system.  The route he chose measured just over 18 miles and my only complaint was Smithies Lane, oh what a hill! AND then he finished with the last mile on Cone Lane with yet another BIG hill and  with the snow lashing into my face - delightful!  Felt great after though, as the conditions weren't great and some of the route was treacherous, but we don't mind running slow to get the miles in and that's just what we did!  50.2 miles in the bag and target hit.  Now go away snow and ice I've had enough of this northern cold!