Slowly Getting Faster

I went up flag rock again from the north.  When I hit the rock I decided I would see where the trail going up goes.  There is a trail sign that says that the trail connects with Steed Creek but it is a lie.  I took the trail for a while, not sure exactly how far but it was at least a mile.  The route is clear for about 1/4 mile then it is marked with orange flags.  The orange flags cut up the mountain into some areas that have clearly been changed since the flags were hung.  There is a lot of fallen trees and the trail itself is mostly disguised by the fallen logs and overgrowth.  I lost any sign of the trail at the point I turned around.  There is another trail up there that says it goes over to hornet creek.  I doubt that it is clear either, but it looks like it cuts across the side of the mountain instead of trying to climb over the top so maybe I'll take that next time.  It would be awesome if there was a way to get from flag rock to steed creek at 6,000 feet.  

 I ran into one of the trail maintenance guys on my way down from flag rock and I asked him about the trail.  He said it was a proposed trail but it hadn't been finished yet.  They are apparently having a hard time keeping up with the overgrowth on flag rock trail at this point and haven't had time to expand their operation up the mountain.  Anyone running wasatch that needs to spend some time doing trail work, Farmington has plenty of it for you. 

 3000' vert., very slow.  

Early morning flag rock run with MattVH. I was slow, he was fast. My average pace for this route today was a full 2 minutes per mile slower than it was 2 days ago. Overall, this took 13 minutes longer than my average time.  I would feel bad about that but this is the third time in three days that I've done this route, and yesterday I tacked on an extra 1,000 feet of elevation gain. I've got to get my legs back up to speed so I'll try again either tonight or tomorrow, or both. 

AP: 13:45, 1,854' vert 

If the course doesn't change from last year, this is the course for the flag rock run.  I ran it today to set a bench mark for the training I will be doing over the next couple of months.  My starting point is 1:27:31.  I would like to get that down to 1:17 or faster before July 14th. I don't know if that is reasonable or not, but I would be willing to bet that last years winner was faster than 12:10 per mile. 

It was hot today, I shouldn't have run it during the middle of the day but that was the time I had available.  I'm planning on making the loop gain tomorrow morning before it gets hot, though probably not the exact course as I did today. I'm also pretty sure it's steeper going from south to north.  The lack of any switchbacks until the last half mile means you're pretty much running up for the first 3 miles.  I might be wrong.  One of these days I'm going to run to the rock and rest my watch so I can see which way has more gain. At any rate, the north to south approach is much nicer than the other way around, but since south to north is the race I guess that's what I should focus on. 

Mount Griffith with my brother as my graduation present.  It was pretty steep and at a pretty high elevation but I felt good most of the way up.  I didn't feel the effects of the elevation until after 10,500 feet. One day I will come back and run the whole trail all the way to Mount Charleston.

3:04:46; 4,017 vertical feet.