• Sloppy and sloggy •
[1 MIN READ]
Forbidden Drive was everything you’d expect after 2 snowstorms…and less. Five of us converged on the trailhead with varying degrees of punctuality and preparedness. The cold made the wait unpleasant for Happ and Teddio, but wait they did. We five intrepids made cautious headway on the snow, focusing on the areas packed by service vehicles. “Cautious” means that, even leading, Tall Dave and I could do an average pace of little faster than 13 min/mile.
Club-pioneer Water Bottle Dave had no complaints when we met him coming up just shy of Valley Green Inn. He traded the bike that I’ve most associated with him during my trail tenure for cross-country skiis. Shawmont Skiing Club.
We runners made it at least to the Inn. I advanced solo and managed to increase the pace to 10½ min/mile despite poorly cleared sidewalks and snow-narrowed roads. All that exertion reduced the pace of my Shawmont Avenue ascent to little more than a trudge that included time in the middle of the street (which benefited from light traffic). A tremulous descent of Port Royal Avenue’s slippery cobblestone preceded a final Manor Avenue ascent.
16 ugly miles. But then who runs Shawmont because it’s easy? We do it #BecauseItsShawmont.
-CtCloser (Calvinthe) “Negative Split or Positive Splat” #dothedue
FINE PRINT ¶Text by Calvin Wang (Wäng), CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. ¶Cross-published: Facebook Shawmont Running Club (ZY Weekly Newsletter 1/20/24), Shawmont Running Club website, Ruminations by CtCloser. ¶This website posting: Rumination only with added caption.
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