Decided against riding in a downpour this morning and went for the evening ride instead. But before that, I ran the kids to the park (2 miles) in the stroller for some family fun. Good times. Later, I headed up Providence Canyon for the usual bike-run-bike. Things got interesting as a black cloud quickly attacked but luckily it quickly passed. Things are coming along nicely on the trail as they have added another section of trail. Its almost complete now.
T- 50 bike 45:30 run 1800' vert
Oh, the leg is doing great. It was a 0/10 for the uphill and only a 1/10 on the downhill. It might actually be healing up finally.
Today was a much needed rest day. My knee caps have been sore since before saturday and it is from riding so much vert on the mtn bike. I decided to take a day off from the bike and do a trail run and let them rest. My leg has finally improved to the point that running for an hour on it is possible and mostly pain free. Things hovered around the 0-1 range but did peak out at a 2/10 for a bit today. I blame it on the steep grade of the canyon. But still. I ran for an hour with no major issues. I am back. Finally.
Biked to the Trail - Ran 7 miles - Felt great - Biked Home - well partway home then I got a nail that went though my tube twice. It was flat in 10 seconds. I didn't have my repair kit with me and I was still 2.5 miles from home. Luckily a nice guy saw what happened and drove me home in his truck. That is the second nail I have gotten on my bike in the street. I am doing all the cars a favor by puncturing so they don't have to.
T- Bike 25 min up - 7 min down
T- Run 1:02:30 (8:56) 1300' vert running 1900' total
Spent the night camping with the kids and a bunch of church friends. That meant that the bike/run would be postponed until the heat of the day. Brutal. At least its a dry heat. Or so I hear. It was a great day though as the stars aligned and I was able to meet up with Paul for a run. Yeah, that is rare, but super cool.
I biked from the house at 11:30 towards Birch Canyon in Smithfield. I headed up Canyon road to BST past Green and along the bench through the weeds and brush. I realized I was going to be late to meet up with Paul so I had to really push it. 15 miles to the start of the singletrack, part dirt, part road, lots of hills. 90 mins. 1700' vert
Once I met up with Paul, we headed up the trail hoping for some shade. I was pretty spent already and it took me a mile to recover. Luckily Paul was in no hurry and we enjoyed the trail together. I really enjoyed the dozen or so creek crossings in each direction. I practically laid down in it a few times. A few miles up the trail, the overgrowth became so bad the trail practically disappeared. It made things REALLY slow. We ended up turning around at Paul's 9 mile mark (4.75 miles for me). Too bad too as we were just getting into the really pretty stuff with loads of flowers and great cliff views. To bad that trail is so overgrown, it could be really cool. We found our way back down the trail. Paul being Mr Cautious was even slower on the downhill. It was pretty interesting stepping into and through plants hoping there was a trail somewhere in there. 9.5 miles 1:47 (11:15) 2400' vert (topped out a 7700')
Paul stepped it up for the final 5 miles or so back to his house. I rode with him for a bit on the bike before bidding him farewell and blasting home ASAP. The final stretch home was hot but I took the flattest and most direct route and got 'er done. 14 miles. 55 mins 100' vert
Great outing. Loved Birch Creek Trail. Well worth it. Wished I had taken the camera. 4200' vert total - Convert to 24 combined equivalent crosstrain/run miles
Was really dragging this morning. It was pretty dark until I got to the mouth of the canyon. I think I slept through half the run too. Just plain tired and a bit sore in the knees from my long day saturday. I guess helping to put in a sprinkler system at my sisters house is not good recovery from a long workout. Weird.
Deer Fence to Millville Canyon and then 2 miles up the canyon and back. Things are finally feeling better for me. I think I have been riding the bike too much and my knees are permanently sore from that. Deep knee bends really hurt. Tomorrow will be a no bike day. Mostly due to the flat I got during my ride to work. I made it to work, but sometime while there it went flat. I couldn't ride home and have yet to fix it so that is that.
Drove up to one of the 12 providence churches and ran from there up the canyon. 1 mile to dirt. 7 miles on trail. No new trail to explore in over a week. Lame. 1 mile back to car. 9 miles total. 1:23 (9:12) 1750' vert
PM: Ran in my new New Balance MT101RX's! Sure, I ran on sidewalk pushing the stroller, but they felt great. There is not much to them. Hopefully they have enough to keep me from hurting myself. Short runs only. I like them though. 2 miles to the park and back.
4 miles on the singletrack and back. There are sections of the lower trail that remind me of the upper section. (Tall grass and plants covering the trail) Yep, the stream is STILL running too. Shoes felt great. They drain well when wet, although my foot does move a bit too much when wet. Good trail for those shoes. Smooth singletrack.
Ok, this isn't the official course, this is Cody's Version. Its much easier, but still awesome. I am in SLC for a cousin's wedding so I got to spend the morning in my old "backyard". I rode the mtn bike from my parents house in Cottonwood Heights to Snowbird, via Top of the World Drive. I also took the Temple Quarry trail (2.75 miles of singletrack parallel to the road). The rest of the way up the canyon was a grunt up the road. It took me 1:40 to get the starting line of the Official SpeedGoat 50K course. I ditched the bike in some bushes and grabbed my waterbottle and hit the trail. I ran this course just over a year ago so the course was a bit fuzzy in places, but for the most part I covered the first 6.5 miles of the course as close as I could. It involved lots of hiking and even some crossing of snow slides. Its rocky and steep and really tough. It took me 1:42 to get to Hidden Peak (top of the tram). It was only 6.5 miles where the official course is 8 miles so I defintely missed some extra running in there. Either way, I tagged the peak and headed down mineral basin so I could go though the tunnel. Once I got there, I saw that the tunnel was closed so I headed back up and over the saddle and down to where the route comes out of the tunnel. From here on, I hit various sections of the course, but mostly was haphazardly heading downhill. I ran some simgletrack, but mostly it was road. I eventually wandered over to where my bike was and decided to call it a day and head home. I was hammered and tired. It was my longest run both in mileage and time since the injury and although things were sore, I think I am just fine. It looks like I am in the clear. I am sad I missed El Vaquero Loco today, but missing it gave me the chance to go to the wedding and take a bit more time to recover. I am happy where I am at though and look forward to the next "thing" (read: epic run or race). Speaking of that, I actually signed up for a Duathlon next weekend. Its in Ogden and is all on trails. Run 4, Bike 10, Run 4, Bike 10. Winner last year was in around 2.5 hours. Perfect. I have been accidently training for this race for weeks now. Should be fun.
Anyway, the bike down the canyon was a blast, even a bit scary. 10 mins to cover 6 miles and lose 3K feet. 20 more mins of taking the long and hilly way home and finally I was done. 35.5 miles. My version of the Speedgoat 50K duathlon.
AM: Deer Fence 6 miles - 52:30 Saw 3 other runners on the trail and 0 deer. Odd
T- 52:30 650' Vert
PM: Jardine Juniper with Joe. It was great! Good to catch up with him and hear details of his race. We even went down to see the tree. It is still there. Fun stuff.
Another nice and easy run today. Felt much better today. One more easy day and I will be feeling good. The lowlight of the run was chasing a dozen cows on the trail for 5 mins. Cows poop lots when they run.
Hurt in the Dirt Duathlon (28 Miles) 02:37:15, Place overall: 5
Slow miles
Fast miles
Total Distance
0.50
18.00
18.50
Hurt in the Dirt Duathlon - 5th overall (individual category)
After looking around the mountain bike racing circuit, this race jumped out at me as a must-do. I have been wanting to do a mountain bike race to see the dividends of biking nearly every day this summer. I thought this would be a fun mix of mountain biking and running. And it was.
The race is held in Ogden at Fort Buenaventura. It is pretty much a random mix of grass, dirt, mud, logs, rocks and sand. The run course even had river crossings and tree jumping. The bike course had sections of sand bogs, tree and stump jumps, rock gardens, tons of short climbs, and more sand bogs. The format was 2 laps of running (approx 2 miles a lap - but probably closer to 1.5) - 2 laps of biking (approx 5 miles a lap) - 2 more laps running - 2 more laps biking. It didn't look too hard on paper. Boy was I wrong.
The race started out calmly enough, but within the first 20 seconds we had our first tree to climb through. I managed to get through it without get mauled by the masses. I hit the first quarter mile in 5:20 pace and I was still in 10th place and getting passed. There were teams of relay guys and gals together with us so it was impossible to see who was a relay guy and who wasn't. I did know there was at least 1 pro triathlete there (the guy who won- Nick Fisher) and I let the lead pack leave me in their dust. I knew I couldn't hammer a 5:20 pace race effort for 2.5 hours. I still hit the first lap pretty hot and was amazed by the pace they hit though this bushwhack of a course.
Over the course of the running, I would drench myself at the stream crossings (this race was at 4pm on a 90+ degree day) to cool off. It was a nice run course as it was mostly shady, but the bike course was exposed and very hot. I wore a camelback during the bike legs and guzzled about 60 oz of water till it ran out 10 mins before the finish. Needless to say, I was hot. I am used to running in 50 degree weather and am a big baby in heat. Whine Whine.
Highlights of the race:
Passing and lapping lots of people!
Battling it out the whole race with a teenager (although he ended up beating me...more on that later).
Speed hiking the steep stair section of the course faster than the guys "running" up it.
Strong last lap on the bike to pass 5th place guy and nearly catch 4th pace (teenager guy).
Low-lights of the race:
Nearly getting lapped by the winner (nearly).
Getting a flat and wasting 6 mins doing a tube change. I was doing quite well (IMO) and just finished my last running section. I had passed Sam Weil (the teen) during the run and had put a bit of time on him as was working on the next guy when I hopped on the bike and took off out of the transition only to find my front tire had gone flat during the last 20 mins. Probably a thorn from the miles of weeds I had ridden through. That explains all the other guys out there pushing their bikes. Lots of flats. Lucky for me, I was next to a booth set up by a local bike shop to help fix bikes on the course. I ran the bike over there and the guy tossed me a tube and I went to work ripping off the old tube and putting on a new one. 6 mins later (I am not very fast at that, I guess) I was back out on the course. I noticed at least 2 guys pass me (probably more), including Sam. It was impossible to tell who was being lapped and who was my competition. I was bummed but still pushed hard the last 2 laps on the bike to try and make up lost positions. I finally caught one of the guys with only a mile to go and was within a min or so of Sam. Can I get him? No. Turns out that I can't and didn't. Darn flat!
Overall, it was a very fun and challenging course. Very technical and with a proper full suspension bike, it would have been even faster. But I had a blast. I never noticed my leg injury and it isn't sore now (a day later). I am glad I did a bike race as payoff for the hours I have spent on it this summer. Now back to running!
Rough splits by my watch
Lap 1: (run) 11:00
Lap 2: (run) 11:30
Lap 3: (Bike) 25:36
Lap 4: (Bike) 25:42
Lap 5: (run) 12:39
Lap 6: (run) 12:16
Lap 7: (Bike) 31:51 (flat tire)
Lap 8: (Bike) 26:37
T- 2:37:15 (watch) 1500' vert
MAP of the course (red is run course, blue is bike)
The Trail is complete! 3 miles one way of sweet singletrack trail. Yes, I have it memorized, but I still love it. I added a mile of Deer Fence after. Recovery going well. Should be back to full strength in a few days.
Nice and quiet run this morning. No bikers or runners today. Just glorious singletrack. The stream is fading away finally. No water for the bottom 2 miles of trail. Still got my feet wet up the trail though. The upper section of green is pretty much covered in tall grass too.
Trail Run with Joe after work today. We headed up Steel Canyon, past the washed out sections of trail (not too many), taking the new bushwhack sections. There were a few stretches of rocky dirtless trail, but not as many as I thought there would be. The overgrowth was bad though. Coming down Steel hollow was fun though as that trail was still in good shape. Great run, nice and easy. Thanks Joe
Deer Fence South past Millville Canyon. Saw a patch of smoldering mountain from the lightning show last night. Not too bad though. I felt like crud so things were slow.
The run started out innocently enough. Although it was way too early. Up at 3:30, picked up Joe at 4, drove to Richmond and started running by 4:30. The idea was to run up High Creek trail to the Lake and then either up to Mt Naomi or Cherry Peak depending on time. Joe had to be at work by 10 so time was tight. We left the car at the start of the dirt road and ran the 3.5 miles up to the trailhead. It was dark of course, but the headlamps were working just fine. We cruised along for a few miles on the nice singletrack blissfully unaware that about a mile into the singletrack, we had missed a critical fork and were climbing up the wrong drainage. We hit a nice waterfall and suddenly the trail practically dissapeared. We continued up the deer trail that remained doubting our route. After a few more minutes, we decided to backtrack to the waterfall and look for an alternate trail to see if we missed it. Surely the trail would be more used than this. Back to the waterfall. Looked around. Nothing better. So we went back up the mountain. This time were were not to be denied. On and on we went. It was through bushes, trees, more bushes and it was impossible. Up and Up we went. Finally, about the time it was starting to get light enough to see, we decided to head right to see over the hill on our right and see if we could find where we wanted to go. We made it to the ridge to look and.....
Opps, we were way off course. I could pick out the proper drainage now that I could see and we were not even close. We had wandered around for 3 miles (19 min, 40 min, and 21 mins) and wasted a lot of time. We bushwhacked back down the mountain the fastest way we could find and you could never guess where we ended up. Back at the waterfall. Seriously? It was a fast mile down the trail until we found the fork that we had blown by hours ago. It was pretty obvious in the daylight. Stupid!
Now we knew we were short on time and would probably not even make it to the lake. We pushed the uphill hard, but it was not going to happen. I figure we were still over a mile away. We stopped at a gorgeous meadow with a small creek and pond. We were just getting to the good stuff. Another day. Time to get back. At this point, we had gone 11 miles and needed to get back in an hour. Luckily, the way back was shorter and Joe brought his running legs. We flew back down the mountain hitting a few mid six min splits. That is the fastest I have run since Feb. I was feeling it. Speedy Joe was cooking though. Those trails are sure fun to cruise down. Good stuff!
I will be back soon to do that run again, but this time I will make it to the Lake!
T- 3:35 (11:37 pace) 4800' vert
The first downward notch is the first trip back to the waterfall. The big peak is us trying to muscle through the brush. The Second big hill is the actual trail.
Pics from the trail....
This is the critical junction. As you can see, the sign obviously points to the right. I am sure it did at least at one time. I am blaming the signage!
The "waterfall". If you see this, you went the wrong way!
We came through that mess somehow. Only minor bleeding to report.
Green Canyon all the way to the Wilderness Area sign and a bit beyond to hit 6 miles each direction. Wasn't feeling real spry today, but I survived. Oh, and the green canyon stream is dry finally.
