64 hardy souls turned out for the 4-miler held in one of the coldest days of the year. When I arrived at Prospect Park, the temperature hovered at 20 degrees, and already Dan Shaw and his crew were setting up their equipment for the pancake breakfast.

I crossed the parking lot very gingerly to see how the footing was going to be, and it was like a skating rink. Bruce Kirschner went out on the course to see what the conditions were, and he reported that they were very icy making any speed questionable for many of us masters runners. However, if you look at the race results, you'll see it had a negligible effect on the high schoolers.

Dressing for the race was a challenge, since we started out being freezing (my feet were frozen even before we started). However, one of the youngest runners showed up in shorts and long-sleeved t-shirt, and Joe Baird, as usual, was in his shorts. At least this time he wore running shoes and socks instead of his sandals since he reported frozen feet while assisting with Bruce's race.

My co-race director, Jim Price, checked out the course earlier in the week. Construction was starting at the west end of the course, and some concrete barriers were already in place. Without his help, it would have been a challenge for me to keep on top of what was happening from my home in Boulder, so he saved me hours of time by checking it out, and deciding that we could run the course as in the past, at least for this year.

Once we lined up to start, several of us at the back of the pack started out conservatively after witnessing a young bicyclist hit the black ice and crashing right next to us. None of us wanted to join him on the ground, but I learned later that two of the runners had also fallen along the course. Fortunately no one was incapacitated. I worried about Olga the whole time since she was running with a newly installed hip, and couldn't afford to fall.

Is this a great club or what? I was fortunate to have so many volunteers to pull off this event. My husband had tentatively offered to be there, but after ten days in Hawaii with temperatures in the 80s, wasn't too keen on the idea. Many thanks to Levi Gonzales who manned the western turn around and to Ken Simons who positioned himself at the east turn around. They had to stand out in the cold quite awhile while those of us in the back of the pack were taking our time completing the course. Joe Sanchez did his usual good job marking the course with cones and providing the water. Tom Alison was all over the place assisting Dan with setting up, and manning the finish line. Where would we be without Connie and Rosalia who faithfully man the registration table? Connie also assisted at the finish line and typed up the finishing results.

For those folks who like to keep an exact log of their times, Jim Price informed me that the official starting clock was begun 15 seconds late.