The Best Day
Lackwanna State Park
As it does every year, Christmas came and went with the blink of an eye. So much anticipation, so much prepping and then boom, it’s done. I must say that this Christmas break has been my favorite as it has been filled with watching Christmas movies, seeing friends, family and of course mountain biking.
Since the snow is here, I have mixed emotions; I love it and hate it. I love to ski but, holy cow have prices gone up and it’s just not worth it this year. So, my skis will hang for the season most likely. Anything more than a few inches makes it tough to ride my bike on trails without cursing at it along with the snow. Riding in snow makes me feel like I have no ability whatsoever. There isn’t enough snow to snowshoe so, what do I do to get some cardio?! Certainly not run on the road because, well, that just sucks, so, off to the woods I go!
I threw on my best Under Armour gear, my wool cap and laced up my Saucony Kinvara summer trail sneaks and headed out to Lackawanna State Park. Such a gem that is so close to us. I parked my PT Cruiser in the snow, sat for a few minutes, prepped my GPS, Pandora and honestly, sat and debated if I wanted to run or not. “Just go, you’ll warm up and like it. You would also like to go home and snuggle up on this cold afternoon too,” I thought.
My Saucony Kinvara trail runners.
I started running much faster than I should have, but anything to warm up in the 28 degree, raw weather. Within about 5 minutes, sweat was dripping from my cap, my hands were sweating and this turned into the best day ever. I have a lot of best day evers and it usually occurs in the woods. Suddenly, on the ground, tracks are spotted. A deer? A rabbit? Nope. A Mukluk! My run followed these fatbike tire tracks up and around the normal loop where I ran into, not literally, the Mukluker having his best day ever experience (shout out to Steve!). He couldn’t believe how great the bike rode in the snow and talked about how he wasn’t even struggling with the bike on the technical stuff. Off he went and on I went with my run and the next 10 minutes, I was wishing for a Mukluk to ride to get my fix.
Hunting mukluk tracks.
All in all, my run was 3.5 miles at a decent pace in the snow. This was the run to get me going and starting to trail run again. Snowshoeing will happen as we get more snow, but a run in the woods clears my head, keeps my cardio up and works those muscles I fail to usewhile riding. With the snow having landed, people will stay inside, wish there was more to do…well, there is a lot to do. The get up and go part of it is the hardest, but when you get out, it could be the best day ever.
Happy Trails!
The infamous, terrible self portrait.
cindy9er 