Sunday Long Run Week Seven

The “Winchester Highlands Run” is a particularly challenging Sunday long run. The long course is 16.2 miles full of hills. It is also a step up week from the previous week’s 12.5 mile run.

Out total elevation gain and loss is 600 feet. Now if that were spread over 16.2 miles it wouldn’t be a problem. On our course most of the elevation change occurs over five hills. The fourth hill around mile 9 just keeps on going.

This year, to make the course even more challenging, we have been dealing with the first significant snow fall of the year.

The MRC Race Series race the “Cupid’s Chase 5K” was cancelled on Saturday due to poor conditions. Monday evening programs in the GBA are being cancelled because we are under a blizzard watch.

Running in Traffic

Because the sidewalks were is such bad shape, we ran most of the course on the road. My friend Don Keren likes to run outside of the white line and in the lane of traffic.

On a few occasions this looked a little dangerous. I try to stay inside the white line but in some places there was so much snow and ice I risked slipping and falling into on-coming traffic.

Where there was shoulder to run on it was often narrow or covered in a few inches of packed snow. Skiers might call it “loose granular,” for us it was like running in sand!

One lady saw us coming, slammed on her brakes and started going sideways. The three of us were running single file on the side of the road. She honked her horn, yelled at us and sped off. If she had just driven by us a potentially dangerous situation could have been avoided.

For the most part drivers used extra caution and often waved us on.

On a few side streets we saw cars coming down a hill towards us. They were going slowly but not all of them had turning wheels. It looked like they all managed to stop, but we did our best to get out of the intersection ASAP.

Sunday Long Run Turn Out

Last week 64 runners showed up. It was a very cold day for a 12.5 mile run. This week the temps were in the low 30’s, it was snowing and a blizzard watch was going into effect sometime during the day.

We still had around 40 hearty souls show up for the run. The Melrose Running Club Sunday Long Run seems to be growing in popularity. The average size group is around 50 and 60 or so runners is not uncommon.

Usually about half of the runners do not belong to the club. And there is a core group from local clubs who show up almost every Sunday.

We meet at Bruegger’s Bagels on Main Street in Melrose. By the time we are done with our run, their morning surge is over. We usually have 25-40 runners stick around for breakfast and to socialize. I’m sure this helps with their Sunday sales receipts!

Before the run we kind of take over the place. With 50 runners standing around, we tend to get in the way. To be more conscientious of the hospitality that Bruegger’s extends to us, we have been trying to keep runners from blocking customers who want to buy breakfast.

Thanks for checking in. Leave a comment or a like if you like what I wrote. I finally wrote a short blog post. So there’s something to like!

Run well my Friends!

Andy