Hi all,

I’m looking for advice on good places for a snow-running training trip in January. I have a race later in the winter and I’ve bought snowshoes that I want to practise with, and I also want to get used to the cold and figure out the right clothing.

Ideally, I’m looking for somewhere with temperatures around -10°C or lower, with mostly flat or gently hilly terrain—something similar to cross-country ski trails. I’m hoping for publicly accessible routes with at least some basic infrastructure, since I’ve never been out in remote snowy areas before and I’d prefer not to wander into a forest and freeze to death.

If anyone is part of, or knows of, a running club in the northern parts of the country that does snow running, I’d love any info. Maybe the simple answer is to go to a well-known cross-country ski resort, so if that’s the case, please feel free to suggest some.

Also if the place is reasonably accessible from a northern European city—either flying in directly or flying to the capital and then taking a train or a short connecting flight.

Thanks for any help

[update: snowshoes are the funny looking squash racket things you attach to your feet to get traction/not sink into the snow – link]

by Bishop_Talleyrand

8 comments

  1. I have no idea of snowshoe running races but Finland has for example tens of thousands frozen and snow covered lakes in winter, so maybe some of them would be good?

  2. Outside. You go outside, snow is there. Not in coastal region in south.

    You should learn cross country skiing using proper forest skis. Nobody runs in snow except some mad tourists maybe. That is just not a thing. Skis are the way to go.

    When exercising in cold you must have thin layers you can adjust if it’s too hot or cold. You should have a backpack with more layers, including maybe a puffy jacket.

    You must be able to change your underwear if you’re going to make a long trip without getting into warm places. You’ll sweat, your clothes will get soaked. Then you’ll freeze and it’s game over.

    Underwear should be made of wool or wool mix, including socks. Yes, plastic alternatives exist also and are sold in stores. No cotton etc. Top layer could be made of wind stopper material but you should be able to adjust its vents.

  4. You might have to explain what you mean by snow running before anyone can give you some reasonable advice. How is it done? In deep snow with actual snow shoes (I’m not talking about winter running shoes here) attached to your shoes? Or just running on snowy roads? That’s just running outside in the winter for us, wherever.

    If it’s the latter, a skiing resort might not be the best place to go. I don’t know how many hiking trails they have in winter but walking/running on the cross-country skiing tracks is either forbidden or very much frowned upon. In fact most of the tracks that you can run on during the summer are converted to skiing tracks in winter, at least where I live. So what’s left for running is sidewalks and other places where people walk.

    You can check out running events from Juoksukalenteri https://juoksija.fi/juoksukalenteri/. The listing has races too, but I believe the Park Runs are very much “go at your own pace” sort of events.

  5. You’ll piss off a lot of people if you show up with those shoes at cross country skiing trails. There is already an abundance of walking idiots who crush groomed tracks with regular shoes.

    That said I’ve never seen anyone wear such things. It’s either cross country skis on groomed tracks or vanilla running shoes on sidewalks.

  6. You are used to snowshoe walking, or that race your first encounter with them? Depending where it is, you should likely find similar terrain, with about the same up-/downhill angles. It is VERY different from running, so I doubt running clubs will help much. They are mostly used with considerable altitudes, where people do not want to use alpine skis for whatever reason. Personally, I would go to alpine ski terrain, and stay clear from all tracks, cross country, and alpine. But I figure that might be the Swiss mountain goat speaking. 🙂 Good luck with that race!

    E: You do not need tracks with those. Just put them on, and start walking, wherever there are no tracks of other sports. To the contrary, the deeper the untouched snow, the better the “muahaha, deep snow, got ya!” experience 😉

  7. I wish you all the luck but this really does not make sense. If you want to move fast on snow, we have skis. It’s like having a bicycle race in sahara, or paddling race on a swamp. It might be good excercise but weird. Where is this competition going to be held at?

  8. January in Finland is kind of hard to predict (as every month). It can be +5C, or can be -35C. Depends a bit where you are, extremes are possible everywhere.

    You could try eg Lahti, and Messilä area near there. Check the snow situation before traveling.

    I tried a bit googling, looks like snow shoe running was somehow trending about 10 years ago, but I didn’t find anything recent easily.

Comments are closed.