Long Trail Run - I am a lucky man to be able to spend the weekend without kids with my wife in Lava Hot springs. That is pretty nice of her, but the really nice thing was that she let me go running for half the day Saturday with no complaining. I figured since I was only 30 mins from the Pocatello 50 Miler course, I had better go do a recon run of it. Jon joined me and also tour guide local Luke Nelson showed us around. We did the first 1/3 of the course with a 5 mile loop added onto the end to get us over 20 miles for the run. The course is not easy. It started out tame enough with nice singletrack heading up a hollow. 10% grade or so for the first climb. We leveled off more or less and sat back and enjoyed the nice muddy trail. Soon we dropped down a canyon and lost all the elevation we had gained. No big deal but the next 3 miles we were to climb about 2000' with most of the climb off trail straight up the side of a mountain. Not easy. First Half Done - 
Second Half - 
I soon realized I was feeling sub-par for the day and settled into my grandpa pace up the hill. Things perked up for me at the top as I had the energy to run down hills just fine. Other than some serious stomach cramps (side aches) things were looking up. That is until Luke took us back up another 500' hill. I didn't have a decent uphill gear and got dropped (even with their easy pace). It took a while on the downhill to catch back up but I more or less just survived the rest of the run. Oh well, gut it out and just put in the effort. The course is sweet with nasty vertical and lots of mud and snow (hopefully most will melt in the next 3 weeks). I was amazed to see the huge network of singletrack that is available to Pocatello-ins (Pocatins?)...people who live in Pocatello. They are very lucky to have so many trails available year round. I am stoked and scared for the big race as it will be nasty-hard. T-3:28:30 (9:53) 21.1 miles 155 ave 178 max SportTracks showed the Vert at 4100' and Loss at 4700' I finished off the day relaxing in scorching hot pools and working on my tan. *Weekly Summary Vert = 8150' Miles = 82.25
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