Running on Twinkies

Bonneville Shoreline Trail - North Salt Lake. Today's run turned out to be the exact same distance as yesterday's run. The Shoreline trail has more elevation, yet I finished 10 seconds faster than yesterday. It was a good run.

At parents house for the holiday weekend. Did a eleven mile loop with my Mom and Dad. They are training for a half marathon in August. I recently signed up for my first official race of the year. I will be running the Bairgutsman on August 6th. 

I met up with Rye today. Not only is he a good runner, but he is also a really cool guy. We ran around the Idaho Falls green belt and also around Freeman Park. It didn't cool off much last night, so it's going to be a hot 4th of July. 

Happy Independence Day everyone.  

Headed out on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail at dusk. Watched an amazing sunset over Antelope Island. 

I ran the lower portion of the Wild Rose Trail today. I must be one of the few people that knows that this trail exists. It is not being used and is way overgrown. I might have to run it again tomorrow, just to pack the weeds down better.

Wild Rose Trail. 

Sunset run. I started on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail in Bountiful and headed North. Crossed Deuel Creek, Parrish Creek, and Bernard Creek, After Bernard Creek I headed up the mountain and looped back to Parrish Creek. There is some fun single-track on that hillside.  

I was only planning on running 14 today, but I was having so much fun in the mountains that I did an extra mile. I started at the Bountiful "B". I headed up the Ridgeline Trail, then up the Buckland Ridge Trail. It comes out onto Skyline Drive. I went up Skyline Drive about a mile, then got on the Tuttle Loop Trail. At the end of it I headed on a gravel road around the backside of an unnamed peak. I would have summitted it, but I didn't have anyone with me to take a picture of the peak jump. Maybe next time. While on the gravel road I came across two runners heading the other direction. They asked me if I was training for Wasatch. It was then that I realized I was on part of the Wasatch 100 course. Ultra runners that I have seen running are always friendly. The gravel road came out onto Skyline Drive. I headed down it back to the Ridge Trails and went back down them to the car. It was a good run with a crazy amount of vert. 

Bonneville Shoreline Trail. I was surprised that my legs weren't more sore from Saturday's run. Today's run was a little slow, but I felt quite good.

I am in Pensacola, Florida for a few days for work. I ran along Tippin Ave today. The run was alright but it wasn't as good as running on trails. I wish I knew where some trails were around here.

For those of you who visited my blog earlier today, and thought 'Oh no, Twinkies didn't make it out today.' Your wrong. I just got out a little late and I ran on a full stomach.

I went out to a steak house for dinner tonight. I had a delicious lobster tail, baked potato, and some steamed broccoli. I topped it of with a giant triple layer oreo ice cream desert thingy. After dinner, I went back to the hotel, put on my gear, and cranked out six miles. I didn't pay attention to my pace the entire run. I figured I was doing about eleven minute miles. When I checked afterwards, my average pace was 9:33. Woohoo. I need to eat lobster tail more often.

2.43 miles before bed.

Today I took my family to the Red Hot Pick Chicks (RHPC) race. We made it a family event. Connor, Jed, and Jaxine all wanted to run the 5k. I pushed Evan and Eliza in the a double stroller and ran with Jed and Jaxine. Connor ran ahead of us. The course is an out and back on the Provo River parkway trail. At about .75 mile Jaxine wanted to walk. We only walked for a little bit because Jed really wanted to run. By 1.5 miles Jaxine was about done and walked again. Jed didn't want to stop and ran on ahead. At 1.8 miles, Jed was about 50 yards ahead of us and Jaxine was getting slower. I didn't want Jed to get lost, so I put Jaxine in the stroller with the other two and ran fast to catch up to Jed. He was a trooper and ran the whole rest of the way. We turned the second to last corner and saw Connor coming back towards us. He had gotten lost. We ran together towards the park. As we got close to the park I made Jaxine get out and finish the race. Connor and Jed finished about a minute ahead of us, and we came in at 38 minutes. 

I turned around and started the half marathon. I was currently in last place with the nearest runner at least 3 miles ahead. I was doing about 9 to 9:30 minutes miles. I started calculating things in my head and figured I could catch the tail end of the runners by mile 7. The canyon was nice today. A bit windy going up, but the weather was good. I saw Lily coming back down and gave her a high five. She was five or six miles ahead of me and I knew I had no chance of catching her. After her I passed several of the other pink ladies making there way down, and a few guys. At the waterfall I passed RAD coming down and she told me that here goal was to stay ahead of me. She was currently over two miles ahead of me, but I took the challenge and tried to catch her. Just before the turned around, I saw Jon and Kelli. They were the tail end of the race. I just had to catch them and I wouldn't be in last. About a half mile later I had caught up with them. I chatted with them a bit, then headed on. My downhill pace was between 8 and 8:30, with several of the miles right on 8:15. I was able to maintain that pace through the to the end. I never did catch RAD. I finished with a total time of 2:34:38. Which gave me a time of 1:56:38 for the half. After the race I ate some delicious goodies and visited with a few of the runners. This is a fun race with lot's of fun people.

Bonneville Shoreline Trail. It was still dark when I started my run. I guess I need to get out my headlamp again if I want to run early in the morning. 

Ran on the Deuel Creek Trail before heading off to do some camping with the family.

Camping at reunion flats is Wyoming. Ran with my dad from our campground to Targhee Canyon campground and back.

Ran up the trail towards Table Rock. I made it up to a steam crossing that required me to get my feet wet to continue. Didn't feel like getting wet, so I headed back down. I was planning on running 10 miles, but settled for 8 and made it back in time for breakfast.

I just got caught up on my blog. I am back home after a week of camping at family reunions in Idaho and Wyoming. Got in a few good runs while I was there. 

Tonight I ran the Bonneville Shoreline Trail to the radio towers. This run is becoming my staple run this summer. I seem to do it more than any other run. It is a easy trail that I can run anytime, but has enough difficulty to still challenge me and make me improve.

If anyone is interested in joining me this Saturday, I am planning on doing a 20 mile run on the mountain trails above the Bountiful 'B'. There are some great trails up there and the route will include a peak bag or two. Let me know if you would like to join me.

I started on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail today. After crossing Parrish Creek, I headed up the Parrish Sunset Trail. The trail doesn't get much use and is a bit overgrown. I guess I should run it more often and get it broke in.

Met Scott and Matt VH at the Bountiful 'B' at 5:00 a.m. We drove up to the Bountiful aid station of the Wasatch 100 course. Our plan was to run from there to Francis Peak and back following the course route. Since we started in the dark, we set out on the wrong trail. It led us up the mountain rather than along side it like we were expecting. We decided to continue that direction and run the course on the way back. After summitting Centerville Peak, we bushwacked our way to Skyline Drive. Once on the road, we ran up to Bountiful Peak. The views were great. We ran some good downhill miles on Skyline Drive over to the maintenance shed. We decided that we would not have time to go to Francis Peak, so we hopped on the Wasatch 100 course. We were doing a good job of following the course until we came to a stream crossing. We couldn't see any trails on the other side of the stream and assumed that we had taken a wrong turn somewhere. We spent the next two hours running around and trying several other alternate options. We stopped to talk to a biker, but he wasn't familiar with the course either. While we were up on a ridge, that we had decided wasn't right, Matt called his wife and she read him the route description off the website. It turns out that we were right the first time. We just had to go down stream a little bit. The first part of the trail after the stream was very overgrown. We finally made it back up to the parking area about two hours later than planned. I ran out of water towards the top and got some out of a small creek. Hopefully it was safe to drink. It was an incredible run and we saw some areas that few people ever get to see.

Here is our route using Google Earth. The red is the route that we took and the yellow is the Wasatch 100 course. You can see all our detours.