Icy roads and screwy shoes

I've already written quite a few posts on how challenging January has been for my running, but I am feeling a little more positive about February. I frequent a small online running forum and one of the women there gave me a big tip (thank you Jo!!!) that has me smiling. She has been doing some of her winter running in shoes that she has drilled screws into to prevent slipping on the ice, and shared the instructional link with me. I know you all can't wait to open this link:

http://www.skyrunner.com/screwshoe.htm

I wasn't sure how much screws in my shoes would help me out, but I had B. dig around in the basement for some appropriate screws and he found enough so I could at least test out the concept on my older running shoes.



I was excited to test them out. As soon as I started down the road I felt a few "bumps" under the balls of my feet so I turned around and went home to see what was up. After taking my shoes off and my orthotics out I discovered that the middle two screws on each shoe were poking through sole on the inside. I took them out and added them to the sides of the bottom front of the shoe, and I will have to get some shorter ones for the middle.

My shoes aren't perfectly screwed, but let me tell you, my first run in them was fantastic! A lot of it was mental. I told myself that I was was NOT going to look down at the ice under my feet, I was going to look ahead and focus on keeping as normal of a stride as possible. Usually I am hopping around trying to figure out which patch of ice looks the least slippery and I am slow and my stride is choppy. This time I put my faith in those shoes, told myself that I was NOT going to slip, and whattdya know, I didn't. It wasn't as if I was running on a clear, dry road, but I could almost fool myself that there wasn't ice under my feet.

The downside is that on the bare pavement you can hear me coming a mile away. "Clack, clack, clack, clack", on my road (which is usually pretty clear because it is a county road and actually gets a few cars and a snowplow once in awhile). My neighbor down the road must have heard me coming and yelled at me to put a scarf over my mouth! It was 15 degrees and she probably hadn't noticed me before but now I sound like some kind of oncoming army so I guess the jig is up.

No problem keeping my secret on the rest of my route. The roads look like this:



Fun, huh?
I'm hoping we thaw out in February.