Whether the weather will wither or not

Slushy messy light snow down yesterday, just enough to make a mess. Temps dropped overnight with dry cold air pushing through, evaporating most of what fell and firming what was left into patchy ice.

My venture to the end of the driveway and lack of suredness under my feet, and still some time until the sun poked it's way over the horizon, had me second guessing the run this morning. I salted the sidewalk and driveway and watched a morning runner navigating the bicycle lane down the street and figured I'll check if conditions on the mains were better than my sidestreet. Not bad, once I got down there, but my plan to warm up in the park and do my usual long hill routine was out. So it was 10 minutes out and 10 back to warm up, hit the toidy and head back out to run up and down Haldon Avenue a few times.

The hill itself was a bit tricky, but passable. The occasional car heading towards the park lot caused a brief pause as the remaining snow banks along with some parked cars meant we both couldn't occupy the lane together and one had to give. 1 ton of car beats 130 pounds of skinny runner. 5 passes on the hill in just over 4 minutes each was it. Can't overdo it as I'm 4 days way from the bay and that requires some semblence of taper.

An hour total, timing the return from the cooldown loop and meet precisely at my front door when the watch clicked over to 1:00:00. I know the routes so well now I can get within seconds of planned mark every run out. Somebody opted to spice up the visual scenery on O'Connor by placing an apple into the mouth of some raccoon roadkill and literally sticking a fork in the furry unfortunate's side. Nice. I was glad to only have passed it twice. I think a call to the city cleanup crew is in order.

Weather roulette is the game now. You don't win anything, you just have your expectations flutter up and down as the forecast adjusts each time. What's of consideration is the wind direction. The ATB runs around Hamilton's inner harbour at the most western point of the lake. East winds cross the lake in full and will dictate the conditions in Hamilton regardless of the forecast. Right now, it calls for 25 klik easterlies and temps just about freezing. That means wet snow in the face for the second 5k leg of the race and along the side for 9 k of waterfront. Two years ago I ran this race in shorts and a T. Whenever I attend this race I bring a bag full of clothes of all types, light and thick, water resistent and not, long and short, making the final call within minutes of the gun going off.

This race isn't what it was before. Running Room now pretty well runs it and that means the obligatory bag of cold food and you're ushered on your way once you're finished. It used to be, up to 2 years ago, beer and pizza and a big room to sit and chat afterwards. I guess the pizza folk got tired of staying up the night before making enough for 3-4 thousand runners. This year it's nearly 9000 in total, about 6000 of them doing the 30k.

Maybe I'll byob. Beer takes on it's own unique characterstic after 18.6 miles of racing.