10 Mile Long Run with Zach

Zach and I did a 10 mile long run today. Part of his half marathon training and a good fitness run for me. I was trying to decide between 10 miles on the treadmill at the rec center together or running outside with all the snow pack, powder and ice. I decided to get him some yak Trax and we'd run outside together, an out and back to Cherry Creek Park. We had about 8 inches over a 3 day period with little melting between.


We started from the house and ran with the yak trax on the snow packed road, they did great. We got on the sidewalk which had been plowed but was not clear and dry and then headed to the park via the old library. That stretch between Orchard and the Library was tough running, deep snow about 8 inches and not a lot of it packed down, light traffic, so we slowed down and it was endurance over pace. Once we got on the path it was better, and then there was a kid that made a nice shovel path from the apartments all the way to the park entrance which made for mostly smooth running. Thanks shovel kid whoever you are.

Once in the park it was packed down, but not smooth. We stayed on the path through the bridge and then toward the marina. At about 3 1/2 miles a truck plow passed us going the other way plowing the path. That removed most of the snow. We kept the trax on. When we got across the road, the path was deep with snow and not very runnable, so we switched to the snow packed road, which was really good running with the yak trax. We had a good pace going as we made our way up the road uphill the last 1/2 mile to the 5 mile turn around point.

We stopped for water and gu, Zach was doing great. Sun was shining, great view of the mountains and the park.

When we headed back, it was so nice running on the road, I told him we should take Jordan road back to the Path. Just before we got to the Road my Garmin flaked out on me. Started beeping and flashing screens and I could not get back to the stop watch screen. After a few minutes it finally responded. I am not sure what happened. So we ran back Jordan Road to the path. Since this cuts the route some, we did an extra out and back on the west side of the road before we got back on the path, a bit too much out because we ended up at 10.1 instead of 10.

When we got back to the path, the plow had been through about 30 minutes ago so it was drying out. We took off the yak trax and secured them (me to my belt, Zach on his elbows) and ran without. We got our pace back down to an 8 minute mile through to the end of the park. We had a bout 2 miles to go, we ran on the shovel kids snow pack without trax, then we had a bout a 1/2 mile of powder, where we toughed it out without yak trax. That was a tough stretch and we really slowed down, but again good endurance.

The last mile we ran on the road then on the sidewalk on the sunny side which was dry back to the house. Zach had a really nice kick at the end and I kicked a bit but let him go. He did great. It was a fun father son run in the Colorado Sun with Snow all around.

10.1 Miles in 1:33:31. A 9:14 pace overall, but we ranged between 8 and 11 due to the snow and traction at various sections.

Garmin Watch Data for Run