What's the Craziest Weather You've Raced In?

Chet Manly wrote:

Trollist wrote:

XC race in 2008, 20 degrees with 45 mph wind gusts. It was sunny but there was snow on the ground so it was getting blown around like there was a blizzard.

I was in that race too, the Club Cross Country Championships in Spokane. I thought it was closer to 15 degrees by the time we finished.

Wind chill was I believe 0 for that race. God that was cold. We pulled up in our bus and I don't think I've ever seen a collection of grown men become so quiet. The flags were horizontal and it just looked plain cold. The warmup was brief and there was no warm down. I flew out that afternoon while a most of the rest of the team came back on the bus the next day. The drive home I'm told took 2x as long as the drive up.

I ran the Trails End 8K in the late 90s just before the race died off and it was held in gale force winds. Winds were from the north/northwest, so the start heading south gave you a great tailwind, then you turned and it was like running while standing still. Add in the downpour and it was downright miserable.

40 degrees and drizzly with occasional wind gusts up to 20 mph

NCAA Regionals at Purdue in '97(?)...the meet WAS actually postponed to the next day due to wind and snow that caused 3' drifts on the course. We got there, warmed up and then found out we had to come back the next day to race...and it wasn't much better. Still windy, but had stopped snowing at least...

Heps XC 2011 was pretty insane. Couldn't feel much of my body for 90% of that.

Racing Workouts wrote:

lkjklj wrote:

2000 NCAA cross in Ames Iowa. -20 w/windchill. Woke up the morning of and the pond just outside my window of the hotel we were staying at had frozen solid overnight. Thought they were going to cancel it...

Photos from the race, including Kara Grgas and Shalane Flanagan-

http://www.runmichigan.com/images/00/ncaad1cxc/ncaad1photos.shtml

Lots of bare legs despite the wind and temp.

Of the men in the 2000 race, Jason Hartmann is the only one I noticed who is still running competitively, but on the women's side, there's Kara, Shalane, Lauren Fleshamn, Tara Moody, Christin Wurth (?), Julie Culley, and Renee Metivier. I wonder why so many more of the women would still be running?

WOU Wolves wrote:

GNAC Conference XC 2002 hosted by Alaska Anchorage. The sub freezing temps and snow on the ground was brutal but the best part was the guy sitting on a 4 wheeler in front of the runners holding a shotgun in case he needed to scare moose or bear that were on the race course

I'm calling this the winner.

Anyone run in the 1996 ny state xc meet in Canton, Ny? The course was flooded due to several days of heavy rain, so it had to be changed at the last minute. I remember running in pouring rain, w/ water up to my knees for the ENTIRE 5k. People lost shoes in the mud. It was one of the most physically and emotional exhausting experiences of my life.

2003 Samson Stomp 5K at Milwaukee County Zoo. Air temperature was -5, wind chill was -18. One guy out of 300 ran in shorts.

Can't think of any running races I've ever done that I'd consider epic weather, but I live in northern Vermont so take that for what it is. Have certainly done running races when it was single digits out, snowing like crazy. No big deal.

The one race that I still shake my head at ("what were we thinking?") was a duathlon: 10k run, 60k bike, 10k run. Late September race, mid-upper 40's, pouring rain. No matter what you were wearing there was no way to stay warm. The bike had a big climb at about the 45k mark, but then of course you had a huge descent after that, which is no fun when you're soaked and freezing. My hands were so cold I couldn't work my brakes, I really have no idea how I survived the last 10 miles of the ride. I should have worn my wetsuit for that race!

Coldest XC ski race I ever did was at Johnson State College. I still have the video of it my coach took, he sounds miserable filming it. I'm sure it was below -20°C (the supposed cut off temp for XC ski races). They pulled over 1/3 of the field with visible frostbite.

Alabama state 10-mile championship, January 2010, in Birmingham. 17 degrees at the starting line. PR for me (6:55 pace, good enough for first over-50). I'd heard the rumors that a certain degree of cold was SO cold that it negatively impacted your performance, but that did not happen. It felt great.

No wind at all, though. I'm sure by New England standards that was nothing, but my blood has thinned after a decade down in Dixie and that was cold.

Ran a marathon on a track in a thunder-snow blizzard caused by volcano out-gassing.

Forgot to mention I ended up winning, but not until after getting lapped. The leader was overcome by pyroclastic flows and could not continue.

As far as cold weather, -10 without windchill in Minnesota. It was a 10k road race. Heat wise...any of the Peachtree 10k's. XC any XC race I ran in Europe. US XC has become too sanitized and whimpy. I ran a XC race in Red Hill, UK? and it would have made almost every American cry and whine. Ran in a downpour in Belgium and thru enough mud that it sucked my spikes off. I love XC!!!

////????//// wrote:

back in 2010, I raced at Canadian XC Nationals in similar (

The collegiate one? In Camrose, Alberta?

I ran an 800 once on pure hate. My hate caused the air around me to sizzle and burn. Several competitors suffered second degree burns and got lapped. As I crossed the finish line, lightning struck the timing scaffold.

10K snowshoe race in Alaska. -24 F

AK-55 wrote:

10K snowshoe race in Alaska. -24 F

Forgot to mention I'm a barefoot runner.

I was there too.............my beard was frozen. The cool down was a sprint to the warm bus!

sorry.................. Spokane 2008