Probably the toughest self-inflicted 6.5 mile I have ever run. Ever since high school I have wanted to return to the Mount Olympus trail head to go after my un-official record of summitting and returning to my car in under 3 hours. Today was the day. Perfect weather for an 8 am start. I was not prepared well since I didn't plan on staying in SLC for the weekend and so I didn't have my trail shoes nor my watter bottle. Oh, well its not that long of a run. I started off pretty aggressive up the mountain but was quickly slowed by the lack of oxygen. The trail is pretty rocky and steep. It starts at about 4800 feet and tops out in about 3.25 miles at 9000 feet. That works out to roughly a thousand feet per mile. Steep. I had a blast running until I was forced to a hike. The final mile before the saddle kicked my butt. Once I hit the saddle (1 hour 3 mins) I get to scramble up rocks the final 500 feet to the summitt. I took my time here and didn't rush it. I signed my name in the mail box 1:21 into the run. I took 5 mins recovery to enjoy the view before making my way back down. The top part was again slow going as I still value my life but once I hit the saddle, the quads were in full use. No diggers today as I managed to stumble back to the car in exactly 2:10. (49 mins down) New record by close to an hour. The garmin measured 6.5 miles, but effort wise, it was a 20 miler. A highlight of the trip up was seeing Mike Doleac (famous Ute basketball player from late 90's) and some other tall dude hiking down the hill. He said hi. I also ran into an old neighbor friend from my younger years. I stopped to talk to him on the way down, but almost fell into a bush as my legs were shaking uncontrollably for a minute after I stopped. I also had a few (20 or so) people do the "what in the world is that crazy guy doing?" comments.
| 