Sunday, January 10, 2010
Braving the elements at Frozen Toe 10K
Roanoke's Adam Childers wins first race of the Roanoke Non-Ultra Trail Series
STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS The Roanoke Times
Connor Gray, 19, of Christiansburg, a sophomore and cross country/track runner at Lees-McRae College, leads the Frozen Toe 10K race on the Chestnut Ridge Trail near the Yellow Mountain Road parkway overpass. Gray finished second in the race.
Photos by STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS The Roanoke Times
Josh Gilbert with Mountain Junkies sounded the horn and lead the runners on his bicycle at the start of the Frozen Toe 10K race that began at New Hope Christian Church on Welcome Valley Road and wound along the Chestnut Ridge Trail on Saturday.
Kari Decker, 31, of Roanoke, opts out of the water stop since she was equipped with fluids as she participated in the Frozen Toe 10K.
Neal Jamison put 3/8-inch sheet metal screws in his running shoes for better traction on the icy Chestnut Ridge Trail.
Mark Taylor is outdoors editor at The Roanoke Times.
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As she looked toward running a race Saturday morning, Samantha Mitchell couldn't help but think that the event's name wasn't quite right.
"I've been calling it the Broken Toe 10K," she said, laughing.
Not that the actual name was too far off.
It was the Frozen Toe 10K, an off-road challenge on the rolling, winding Chestnut Ridge loop trail just outside Roanoke.
As race director Josh Gilbert briefed the 93 hardy runners who had decided to brave tough footing and single-digit wind chills, he was blunt.
"If you run it like it's a road, it's going to be slick and treacherous," Gilbert said. "If you run it like it's a trail covered by ice and snow, you'll be fine."
You'd think a warning like that might elicit groans. But not from this crowd.
They laughed.
You see, off-road runners revel in this stuff.
Even when trails are in perfect condition the footing is challenging.
Unlike running on pavement, there can be no mindless -- aka, boring -- plodding when nearly every step is a potential ankle-breaker.
"It's fun and challenging," said John Robinson, a 51-year-old dentist from Roanoke who finished fifth. "It makes you think the whole way.
Stephanie Klein-Davis | The Roanoke Times
Connor Gray, 19, of Christiansburg, a sophomore and cross country/track runner at Lees-McRae College, leads the Frozen Toe 10K race on the Chestnut Ridge Trail near the Yellow Mountain Road parkway overpass. Gray finished second in the race.
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"It's much more interesting."
Saturday's race was the season opener for the Roanoke Non-Ultra Trail Series.
The circuit is known as RNUTS, which is appropriate because plenty of these folks are a little wacky.
Take 19-year-old Connor Gray, who wore only a thin singlet over his torso.
"If you show up wearing that, you better be fast," said one chuckling runner before the race.
And Gray was fast, finishing second.
Trail races attract some road-racing speedsters, but many trail fanatics are focused on off-road running.
Mitchell, a 27-year-old who lives in Bedford and is an administrative assistant for the Home Shopping Network, started running trails just a couple of years ago.
"I just fell in love with it," said Mitchell, whose husband, Matthew, also raced Saturday. "It's very different than the road.
"It's much funner."
She raced the RNUTS last year, her first year of competitive running, and finished in a tie for second in the women's series.
Mitchell is off to a good start this season. Not only did she manage to not break a toe, she didn't fall a single time on her way to being the first female finisher in 54 minutes, 47 seconds on Saturday.
Some runners altered their gear in an effort to better handle the conditions.
A few slipped special running crampons, such as Yaktrax, over their shoes to better handle slick spots.
Neal Jamison of Roanoke tried another traction tactic.
Friday night he drilled about a dozen 3/8-inch sheet metal screws into the soles of his Asics trail runners.
"It's pretty random," he said, shrugging and looking at the screw layout. "But it worked."
Jamison said he can usually cover the 5.6-mile loop in about 50 minutes during training runs. Despite an extra half-mile -- the race started and ended at the New Hope Christian Church a short ways off the trail -- Jamison still broke 50 minutes for the race.
Adam Childers is another trail regular who was eager to race on his familiar training ground.
"I've run the Chestnut loop a bunch of times," said Childers, a 28-year-old from Roanoke who just started as a math professor at Roanoke College. "I was excited."
Childers started conservatively, content to fall in behind early leader Gray, a Christiansburg High School grad who runs for Lees-McRae College in North Carolina.
He made his move about halfway through the race, on the grinding climb from Yellow Mountain Road up to the campground.
Childers won in 41:27, about a half-minute ahead of Gray.
"When he passed me he wasn't even breathing hard," said Gray, who said he does a lot of his training on the trails around Banner Elk, N.C.
Gray was among the runners who spent some time off his feet, but it wasn't ice that got him.
"I was so busy trying not to hit ice that I hit a root," said Gray, who skinned up his bare shoulder in the fall.
Carol Royal also tumbled.
"It was icy and snowy and I fell," said Royal, 41, who lives in Vinton. "My butt is going to be sore."
But she said that with a smile.
"The snow and ice only added to it," she said of the fun.
The next race in the series is a 5K in March at Explore Park.
The snow and ice should be gone by then. Not that it matters.
