it's 18...why not take a run?

after reading my blog post about tuesday's torture ride you were probably thinking i was pretty tough, but i have actually taken it to another level today. the last time i checked the weather before leaving work today it was 26 (while it was 55 in columbia! damn you, flat landers!) and sunny. i opted out of a freezing cold ride and decided to do a freezing cold trail run instead. usually cold weather makes me lazy and sluggish, but for some reason today i felt great on the trail. i ran at bent creek, in and around the lake trails, for 45 mins - the longest i've ever run in my life! and i ran faster than i ever have on a trail. do you ever get that feeling when you're riding when you get a kind of burst and feel like you can go faster than normal? maybe it's just me, but i experienced that running today for the first time. usually running is a struggle from start to end for me, but today it just clicked. until the last ten minutes. at just under 30 mins i decided to do another lap around the lake because i was feeling good and wasn't ready to head back to the car yet. about 5 mins into that lap i realized my face and legs were about to freeze off. how could my legs be that cold when they had 2 layers and were doing so much jiggling around?! and my chins? you'd think they'd have some extra insulation. even my ipod was too cold and it quit working (2nd time that has happened this winter). i made it back to the parking lot without getting frostbite and while driving home saw that the temperature was actually 18, not 26! how did i live in massachusetts all those years?

can it get much tougher than me? share your story if you think you can out-tough me.