Trail Monster Running

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Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Local Exploring

This winter I've been doing a lot of my mid-week runs from Hardy Rd heading north on snowmobile trails, but never really considered taking the trail in the other direction. Today Emma did some exploring on the southbound snowmobile trails and came back with a good report so I went out after work and attempted to follow her tracks.I studied the map of her route before heading out, and I thought I had it in my head pretty good, but once the sun set I pretty much lost all sense of direction and ended up going entirely in the wrong direction just after a mile into the run. Once I realized my mistake I got back on course and did pretty well for the rest of my run, although I didn't get as far out as Emma had.

Emma's Route - My Route 

Recent warm weather with rain, then a few cold nights has left the snowmobile trails in pretty good shape, hard packed and a little icy, but not a problem with Ice Spikes in my shoes. There was a lot of running water along this route, with bridges across small streams, but it was a reminder that the snow is on the way out for the season. I have to admit that I'm a little sad to see it go, I love running snowmobile trails and I'm running out of time for exploring this one that we just found. Looking at the map I figured out that I'd be able to make an 8-9 mile loop on these trails, and the whole thing could be connected up to the Jungle Run to make a big 18 mile loop. I hope the snow lasts long enough for me to give it a try.


I was pleasantly surprised with the pace for this run, not terribly fast, but anything under a 9 minute mile on icy snowmobile trails at night seems pretty good to me.

time: 1:02:36
distance: 7.28 miles
pace: 8:36

gear: Inov-8 Oroc 280 with Ice Spikes, wool socks, tights, 2x long sleeve shirts, 2x thin gloves, buff

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