Nick Jubok

"The seasons when I did a lot of snowshoeing, I've always had good races to start the season," said Somers' Nick Jubok, who trades his track shoes for a pair of snowshoes the minute the first flake falls.
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Jubok said he sometimes organizes night runs when there is a full moon.

"To be the first person running through the snow is great," he said.

Jubok, 48, heads to Mohansic Golf Course when the snow is deep, and during a sunny day last week he ran effortlessly over the rolling hills, over peaks the wind made nearly bare, and sank into drifts that threatened to reach his knee.

Jubok has never been idle in the winter, and he has never been on a treadmill.He tried cross-country skiing to stay in shape but found his medium when he strapped on a pair of snowshoes.

"You can go into the woods and break a trail there," said Jubok, a landscape contractor who has the winters off.

When he got his first pair of snowshoes , the tennis racket variety , Jubok wasn't nearly as adept.He would walk the course and jog down the hills.As he improved, he jogged the flats and ran downhill.

"I can do half the distance, and it's a much better workout," he said.

The challenge is personal for Morra.She is a physical therapist at Helen Hayes Hospital in West Haverstraw, so she knows exactly what rocky terrain can do to knees and ankles.Yet in her 40s, she has found the fortitude to stare down a mountain she might not even want to descend with a pair of poles to lean on.

"At first I just wanted to do it for the challenge," she said.