Rail trail in the snow

In the most unusual fall of 2020, our athletes have been doing their best to focus, train hard and stay motivated. It’s not easy. Without the compass of a season – or seasons, really, as we await the fate of upcoming months while nervously watching Covid-19 case numbers creep up and beyond record numbers nationwide – it makes it challenging to train with a level of coherence. There are workouts, long runs, weekly mileage goals and other metrics to chase. It’s still not easy. Clamoring for time trials and intrasquad scrimmages started over the summer and continued into the fall. Intrasquad scrimmages were out of the question – too many bodies in the same place, as we have been relegated to training in smaller “pods” each day. We waited until there was a level of coherence and consistency in training before entertaining time trials. Finally, as things started to coalesce a bit, time trial plans started falling into place for a few weeks ago. But then they became unhinged when the college went on a weeklong pause to stem the tide of a small Covid outbreak. Poof, there goes the time trials, and the coherence of a team in training.

The weather this fall has been glorious. Cool nights, warm days, incredible foliage. But the calendar is relentless and the mid-Hudson Valley is not San Diego, and so late October started looking and feeling like late October around here this past week. Still, as we restarted and regrouped, the time trials plan moved forward, with Friday, October 30, as the date circled on our calendar – a group of guys wanting to blast out a hard mile, another group of guys signed up for the virtual MAAC 5km. But the long-range forecast showed a big, fat snowflake several days in advance of Friday. Should we move the time trial back again? One training pod – the group that had locked in on the 1-mile distance for a time trial – was emphatic: No. We’re running it, weather be damned. And so yesterday morning, in the snow as the heavy wet flakes blunted those beautiful fall colors, the guys piled into their cars and made the short drive up the hill to the Morgan Lake trailhead of the Dutchess Rail Trail. I had marked out the linear 1-mile course last week with pink flags, which were now sagging under the weight of the snow. I picked a section where there were no road crossings. It was cold, damp, miserable and the big fat leaves were wet and slippery on the paved trail. Some guys donned their high school singlets. Some guys wore racing flats. And away they went, sprinting their hearts out down the snowy rail trail. Sophomore Brendan Dearie overtook classmate Paul Sandford in the final 200 meters for the victory. The times and places didn’t matter, don’t matter. On this morning, we were all winners because we felt like a team again.

Time trial weekend continues later this morning, as guys from a few other training pods will do the virtual 5km on the Hudson Valley Rail Trail over in Highland. It won’t be snowing, but it’ll be pretty darn cold – as I type this, it’s a brisk 25 degrees outside. By the time the guys do the 5km, it’ll be closer to midday (classes are in session on Saturdays during Fall 2020, so we cannot go any earlier than our normal weekday 11 a.m. practice time). The guys who time trialed the mile will be out there cheering on their teammates, just as the 5km guys were out there yesterday shivering in the wet snow. We were supposed to be up in suburban Albany today for the actual MAAC XC Championships (not the virtual one, the actual, real one). A brisk, sunny morning, with the Colonie Crossings ground hardened by the Friday snow. Cross country in the Northeast at its best. In 2020, at least in our conference, a chilly rail trail will have to do this weekend.