Two pieces of wisdom from the wise old Gambler aided me during this race. The first bit of advice I remembered was “You got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em, know when to walk away and know when to run.” and the other was “Now Ev’ry gambler knows that the secret to survivin’ is knowin’ what to throw away and knowing what to keep.” Today was the day I had to fold’em and walk away. It just wasn’t a good day for me to run this wonderful race.
Punk the Monk was held at Deer Grove East in Palatine, IL. We ran a standard trail race with one additional challenge, beat and punk the monk (AKA the race director in a monk costume)! It’s a great idea. A few people punked the monk. I knew when to fold’em and walk away. It seemed like everyone had a good time.
I love running in blankets of snow. However, it was a packed down course kills the ankles. I didn’t have eye protection so I can see and compensate for the variations in the white snow. Towards the end, I was afraid of developing snow blindness. I slowed my pace down and walked for short stretches. I asked myself, “Why sacrifice yourself for this when I have an entire year of running and riding ahead of you?” I did take something positive from this race. I realized how out of shape I am despite breaking my Kortelopet time by over 25 minutes in February.
I had a shitty trail run today. At least I got a beer (Porter), mason mug, (ran outside*), and a shirt out of it.
*added after a monk reminded me the awesomeness of this perk!
Good call about folding them when you know you should. Also, that beer looks delicious!
A sh*tty day on the trail is better than an awesome day stuck indoors!
@Pete B: Thanks Pete and yes that beer was Deeeelish!
@Muddy Monk: Amen brotha! Amen! I had a bad race but I was happy to be out playing on the trail. I made up for a bad race by test driving a couple of Scott road bikes.
Mmmmmmm beer. Even though it was overcast this weekend, I ran with sunglasses. The snow is bright!
@Maggie: It’s blinding bright! After test driving some bikes, I started shopping for some eye protection.