Moab Red Hot, Time to Run on Some Dirt

Well, I suppose I should write a race recap from Moab, so here it is.
I raced, I ran, I came in 131st out of 299 runners that finished.  Probably about 350 started.  My time was 6:19:43, not my fastest, not my slowest here.  Ok, I'm done.  Oh, I was 8th in my age group (50-59) out of 22.  I felt pretty good the entire day.
Ok, here's more.
This is the third time I've made the trek to Moab in Feb. to run the Moab Red Hot 55K.  This is a super early season race that draws a lot of people, mostly from the Salt Lake area, but also a large contingent comes over from Colorado and quite a few from Idaho as well.  I think all of us want to get away from the snow for a few days and run on some dirt.
This year did not disappoint in the dirt department.
Karen and I took off Friday afternoon from the smoggy skies of the Salt Lake area and as we went further and further south, the air got clearer and clearer.  It was wonderful.  Not only that, but there was less and less snow, also wonderful since we've had a foot or more on the ground at our house since before Christmas.  I remarked as we were driving that I should do some dirt angels once we got down there.
The weather looked to be pretty much ideal, low around 25 on race day and warming up to around 50 with clear skies and no wind.
We got down to Moab while it was still light and in time to check in at Eddie McStiff's.  While my plan was to get in and check in, I always see friends and have to stop and chat.  I always get introduced by friends as "the RD for the Buffalo Run" to people I don't know.  We had a hotel room at the Best Western across the street from McStiff's, awesome.  We also had a Groupon deal for the hotel and got a king room for $55/night, double awesome.  Then we found out that a bunch of the HUMR crowd was at Jake's Place for dinner.  That's right next door to the hotel.  Triple play.  It was going to be a good weekend.
After dinner with the crew, we went back to the hotel and hit the hay.  Sleep was kind of hard to come by, the mattress wasn't that comfortable and we were both kind of cold all night.  Plus I could hear someone snoring in the room next door.  Oh well, that's the way it goes sometimes.
We got up around 6am and headed upstairs for the free breakfast.  There were already a bunch of other runners up there, imagine that.
Karen and I made it to the start at about 7:30 and met up with the rest of the Ogden crowd.  The temp was a bit on the cool side, around 25, but there wasn't a wind blowing and I had on my wool coat.  Glad Karen was there to cart it back to the car for me.  I had thought about wearing stretchy pants, but opted for just running shorts, a couple of long sleeve t's, gloves, and a beanie.  A little cool just standing there but once we got started it was fine.
Chris started us just a couple of minutes past 8am and about 400 of us started up the hill.  For those that don't know the course, it starts out going uphill, then drops down into a drainage.  The course itself follows several different jeep trails over the sand, slickrock, washes, etc. just north of Moab.  At about mile 2, I met up with Andrea Martinez.  She's a friend from the Salt Lake area and we hung out together for the vast majority of the race.  We were running about the same pace, she's actually faster, so it made me work a bit to keep up.  it was fun to chat the miles away and before we knew it we were at the first aid station ( mile 6).  I looked at my Garmin and we were maintaining around a 9 minute pace.  I thought this was way fast for me, but I felt good and it wasn't too much work.  By about mile 9 we were up on the top of the mesa and could look down about 800 feet to the starting line and the cars below.  Yeah, the trail takes you right to the edge of the cliff.  Lots of other runners, had stopped as well to enjoy the view, take pictures, and ooh and ahh.  The view was spectacular, the La Sal mountains off to the SE, crystal clear air, sunshine, in a word gorgeous.
meanwhile we kept on clicking off the miles.  We saw a few other HUMR's along the way. At about mile 8 we caught up to Shawn.  She was having a bit of a rough time but doing well.  At about mile 17 we passed Debbie's husband's truck.  Lane was there along with Pam cheering on everyone.  We rounded a corner and came up on both Aric and Jared.  Both were having a bit of a rough patch as well.  Jared later caught up and ran the rest of the race with us.  We ran with Cory for a few miles.  The course was in great shape, pretty much dry.  A few muddy spots and a couple of icy spots as well.  There was a bit of snow in the shadows, and sometimes negotiating these areas got a bit dicey, but it's all part of the game.  Before we knew it we had hit the last aid station and knew we had about four miles to go.  At this point, the course was on a dirt road with a slight downhill to it.  We started pushing a bit just to see if we still could.  Jared and Andrea eventually pulled ahead of me a bit and ended up finishing a couple of minutes before me.  It's always fun to come down that last stretch knowing the finish line is just around the corner.  I crossed the finish line in 6:19:23.  I was kind of hoping for a sub 6 hour time, but knew I probably didn't have the training in needed for that.  Still, I was happy with my time.
I felt great the entire time.  My ankles got sore, but that's from all of the slickrock, and off camber running you do in this race.  The legs held up fine, very little soreness the next day
The best part of the weekend was the post race HUMR party.  There must have been around 30 people in the condo eating drinking and having a good time.
The next day Karen and I decided to go to Arches National Park.  I had never been there and she hadn't been since she was a kid.  We saw plenty of other Moab runners out there since that's the place to go the next day.  We made the hike out to delicate arch, probably the most photographed arch there.  It's much bigger than I thought it would be.  When we got back to the car, Karen noticed a large puddle of oil underneath the car.  Not a good sign as it was transmission fluid.  We got in and hoped  we would make it back to town, let alone back to home.  We stopped in town and bought a couple of quarts of transmission fluid thinking that we could get home on that.  After I poured it in, I looked under the car and watched it drain out on the ground.  Now I knew that we probably wouldn't be able to make it home.  Thank goodness we found a parts store that was also a U-Haul rental place.  We ended up renting a truck and trailer to tow the car home with.  Yeah, not a good way to end the weekend, but at least we didn't need to stay an extra night and wonder how we were going to get home with a busted car.
Ended up that some sort of plastic tube going out of the transmission had basically disintegrated.  I got that replaced, had the tranny flushed and serviced and wasn't out too much money.  It could have been a whole lot worse.  So, the car is good for another 100K miles :-)
All in all, not a bad weekend.  It was good to get away from the snow, run on some real dirt and see lots of friends.

Kind of political post time

Normally I would post something about my running adventures, but I really haven’t had any lately.  I’ve spent most of January indoors on the treadmill.  Yeah, I’m a cold weather weenie at heart.  Instead I thought I post a little something for people to think about.  Maybe get a little dialog going.

Meanwhile, here are my running numbers for the month. 

Miles ran – 173, not as many as last year (200), but given the weather, not too bad.

Ahhh, the lovely inversion we had a couple of weeks ago is now gone, but another one is building.  Hopefully this one won’t be as bad.

One of the things I’ve noticed with this inversion is the great hue and cry throughout the local area for Governor Herbert to “do something about this smog”.   So my question is, what the hell is the Governor going to do?  Let’s see, he could ask everyone to ride mass transit.  Yeah, that’ll work.  He could ban cars from downtown SLC.  Yeah, that’ll work just about as well. 

Arguably, cars are the largest single point source of pollution here in the Salt Lake Valley (57%).  I did a little research and wasn’t able to come up with hard figures for everything, but here goes.  The combined population of Utah, Salt Lake, Davis, and Weber counties is 2.13 million (2012 est.).  I couldn’t find out how many cars are registered by county in the state, so I’m estimating that there is one vehicle per person here.  That makes 2.13 million vehicles trolling the highways and byways most every day.  Most of these cars emit much less pollution than cars of even 5-10 years ago.  Still, 2.13 million clean running vehicles still will emit a lot of dirty air, especially when concentrated in an area 15 miles wide by 75 miles long.

So, disregarding the relevant politics of this fair state, what are some options for reducing the number of vehicles on the roads by an amount significant enough to make the air clearer.  By the way, I have no idea how many cars that would be, but for the sake of argument, let’s say one third.  So reduce the number of cars on the roads by 700,000 on a daily basis.

How do we get all of these people out of their cars.  I know, let’s have the Governor tell everyone to not drive and take mass transit.  Nope, that ain’t gonna happen.

What I have found and learned over the years is that people will respond in a big way to money incentives.  Either negative (hits you in the wallet), or positive (puts money in your wallet).  Look at what happened when the price of gas hit $4.50 a couple years ago.  Ridership on Frontrunner and buses went way up.  When gas prices came back down, ridership went down.  If the economic incentive is great enough, people will put up with the inconvenience of riding mass transit.

I can only use myself as an example, but a previous employer of mine purchased premium UTA passes for every employee then sold them to the employees for a whopping $100/year.  These passes were good on Frontrunner, express buses, local buses, TRAX, anything UTA had on wheels.  Now it costs me a lot more than $100/year to drive my car back and forth to work.  I track it and on average, my car costs me $155.00 a month in gas alone.  Couple that with car insurance (maybe $60/month, I’m a safe driver), plus oil changes, repairs etc. at about $100/month, and you have over $300/ to operate my car.  Now I really can’t include costs other than gas, because I would still own a car regardless.  So, gas costs are my driving factor to decide whether I switch to mass transit.

Now I did buy one of those passes, and I used it pretty religiously.  I discoverd that I could walk to the bus stop .3 miles from my house, catch the bus, it would take me to the train station, I would climb on the train for the 15 minute ride from Ogden to Clearfield, get off, then take the bus from the train station that went through the Freeport Center.  Actually, it was pretty convenient as far as mass transit goes.  However, it would take me about 45 minutes to get to work every day.  If I decided to run to the train station, then to work, then reverse, we’re talking about 90 minutes each way (added bonus, I got a 13 mile run in by doing that).  Contrast that with the 20 minute commute in my car.

Once the company quit buying the passes, I quit riding the train unless I wanted to get a 13 mile run in.  Why?  Because a regular monthly pass would cost me $189.  So, would I pay $189/month for the privilege of at least doubling my commute time?  Nope, not worth it to me, and I would imagine that most people feel the same way.  Besides, I can’t do errands on the way home when I ride the train or bus.  Additionally, traffic on the freeway at 6:30am through the Ogden area isn’t bad at all.  Moves right along at the speed limit.

So, what are some economic incentives that might get a significant number of people to use mass transit.

Motor fuel tax – Currently the state collects $0.245 for every gallon sold in the state.  This tax pays not only for mass transit, but upkeep on the roads as well.  This tax generated $252.5 million in 2012, or about $88/person, young or old.  Let’s jack it up to $1/gallon.  Would that get you out of your car?  What about people in very remote parts of the state that need to drive long distances to even get to a store?  What about poor people that can barely afford gas for their cars now?  Jacking the motor fuel tax up that high would generate an additional $750 million a year that could be allocated for mass transit, purchasing more buses, building more train tracks, etc.  Guess what, it wouldn’t generate that much because a certain percentage of the population would migrate to mass transit as a way to avoid that.  But that’s what we want.  Then there’s the politics in this state.  Do you think someone living in say, Boulder, Utah wants to see their gas tax go up just so us idiots in SLC won’t drive as much?  Yeah, didn’t think so.

Sales tax – Currently Utah (0.8%), Salt Lake (0.8%), Davis (0.5%), and Weber (0.75%) collect a sales tax that is directly used for public transportation.  I have no idea how much this generates, but I can make a somewhat educated guess.  The state sales tax (4.7%)  generated $1.601 billion in 2012.  That works out to $556 for every man, woman, and child in the state.  My math (weird though it may be) says that’s $118.30 per percentage point per person.  So, doing the math says that the good people of Utah and Salt Lake counties paid $94.64/person for mass transit, Davis county residents paid a paltry $59.50 per person, and Weber county folks paid $88.73 each.  Keep in mind this is per person.  So Mom and Dad paid up for their brood of six or seven kids ($94.64 x 8 = $757.12, that’s some more serious coin).  All told, my math shows that the 2.13 million people living along the Wasatch Front generated roughly $188.9 million in 2012 to be used for mass transit purposes.  Sounds like a crapload of money.

So, in order to be fair, let’s increase the mass transit sales tax only in these counties.  What should we jack it up to?  Let’s say a straight 1.5%.  That would generate around $378 million annually for mass transit.  Hopefully.

So, with all that extra money, what will it get us?  Well, a new CNG powered bus (don’t want a diesel one, they really throw out the stink) costs roughly $330 thousand.  It costs roughly $125/hour to operate.  Figure 16 hours a day, seven days a week (yeah, we want people out of their cars then too) and you have a cool $730 thousand a year to operate….per bus.  So, an extra $189 million would get us an extra 258 buses on the road.  And that doesn’t include the cost of the buses.  We’ll let the feds pay for those.  Oh wait, now our federal taxes will go up.  Not so many now.  I don’t know how many buses UTA operates, but I’m sure it’s well over 258 buses, so we won’t even double the number of buses on the road, let alone increase the number and frequency of routes.  Now the number would probably be higher, since fares will offset some of this operating costs.   But we haven’t even talked about fares yet.

You can do the math, but the point is, would increasing the sales tax by roughly 0.8% to get more buses and trains out there get you out of your car?  No?  What about increasing it to 2%?  3%?  Probably wouldn’t get me out of my car but then I don’t have kids at home anymore and I can afford the extra and still drive my car.  At what point would it hurt someone like me enough to get me out of my car one third of the time?  I don’t know, but it would certainly be more than the good citizens of this state are willing to put up with.  Let alone the having the legislature even entertain the idea.  Why increasing the sales tax that much would hurt all sorts of people.  Poor people, car salespeople, retail people.  Think of all the coffee that wouldn’t get sold at Maverick or 7-11 every morning.  Rest assured, we would buy less of everything, but at least we’d be riding mass transit.

Next blog post, I’ll talk about some more options and the pros and cons of those.  Actually, the next post should probably be my Moab Red Hot race report.  Especially since I have most of it written.

The year in review, it's about time

Well, 2012 was a pretty good year running wise.  I’m still disappointed with my failure at Wasatch, but oh well, life goes on and there’s always this year.

I managed to run more miles this year than I ever have.  2515 miles total.  I also ran a messload of races.

The years started with my running the Kahtoola Snowshoe25K.  My time wasn’t spectacular but I did it more as a lark than anything.  Since my lovely wife had started running the previous fall, I entered her in her first race, the Kahtoola Snowshoe 5K.  She was all sorts of worried but I told her to just walk the thing and have a good time.  She had been running up to around 8 miles so 3 miles was no big deal.  Turns out she came in second place for the women and told me if she had pushed she could have taken first.  Not bad for a first race of any sort.

The first Saturday in February had me running the StridersWinter Training Series 5K.  I like to run this race to remind me of how much short races like that really really suck.  Still, I managed to run my fastest 5K time in probably 15 years on a difficult course.  I came in 75^th out of 485 runners and managed a 23:33 time.  Maybe I can go faster this year.  A couple of weeks later I ran the Moab Red Hot 55K and managed to cut about 30 minutes off the previous year’s  time.  March brought a temporary hold to the running since it’s hard to do that and get ready for the Buffalo Run at the same time.  April found a bunch of the Happy Utah Mountain Runners making the drive to the Grand Canyon for a little rim-to-rim-to-rim action.  The big surprise this time was the snow that fell Friday night.  It was very cool to see the Grand Canyon in a different way.  April also saw me run the Salt Flats 100 out by Wendover.  Interesting run to say the least.  My time wasn't what I had hoped, but that's the way it goes sometimes.  In May I ran the Timp Trail Marathon for the third time.  My fastest time yet.  In June I ran the Logan Peak Trail Run.  I think I've done this four times now and it's easily one of my favorite races of the year.  Gorgeous scenery, tough course.  Ran my fastest time ever here as well.  July?  Well, the annual self abuse of Speedgoat happened.  Good Lord that course is tough.  I get really depressed when it takes me over nine hours to run a 50K.  Sigh!  August saw a bunch of HUMR's heading up to Oregon to run the Waldo 100K.  This was my sixth year running this race.  I love it and I'll keep going back.  The course was altered some due to a forest fire, so comparing times to past years wasn't possible, but I had a great day out there.  September brought my annual trip thru the Wasatch.  This year I didn't make it and ended up dropping at Upper Big Water.  Still, I did make 62 miles of the course.  There's always next year.  In September I also paced a friend to his first 100 mile finish at The Bear.  I think I might run that one this year.

Yeah, so that was my racing season.  Quite a few.  Had a good time at most of them.  So what about the rest of my running?  Well, since I am an Engineer, here's the stats and graphs.

Miles - 2434

Vertical - Not nearly enough, but still a lot, around 300,000' I think.

This last graph kind of tells the story of the year.  More miles in a year than I ever have.  Even though I slacked off the last couple of months.  Maybe in 2013 I can get close to 3000 miles?

Random post time

Haven't posted anything in awhile so I thought I would for those that have a burning desire to know what's going on in my running (and other stuff) world.
November was a total bust running-wise.  I think I ran a whopping 112 miles for the month.  With Karen out from back surgery, I've been doing all of the chores around the house.  Feeding all the critters we have, plus things like laundry, cleaning, cooking, etc. has put a damper on the running as of late.  But that wasnt totally unplanned or unwanted.  It gave me a chance to take a little breather from the running.
Since Karen was off of work until the first part of Jan. I kicked her out of the house for a month and shipped her to SoCal to see her family.  Doing this accomplished a couple of things, first, she wouldn't be tempted to do things around the house that she shouldn't be doing, and second, it gave her some extended time with her family.  Something that a lot of us don't get a chance at with work and such.  So she's been having a good time spending all of our money.
Other news, we have another grandchild.  Savannah Grace Weber was born on Dec. 2 weighing in at 6lb 12 oz and 18 inches long.  Mom and baby are doing wonderful and we get to see them at Christmas!!
So what's up with the running?  Well, I've been starting to put together my 2013 race and other event calendar.  So far, I'm planning on running several 100's plus some other races, so it looks to be a somewhat intense running year.  Right now the only two 100's I'm signed up for are Zion and Salt Flats.  I've put in for the Wasatch lottery as well.  Other 100's under consideration are Bryce, the Bear, and Badger Mountain.  We'll see how the training goes through December.  Some of the adventure runs I'd like to knock off the list are a run through Bryce Canyon National Park, a circumnavigation of the Tetons, and another run in the Grand Canyon.  The GC is already on the calendar for the fall.
One little local adventure "run" happened a couple of weeks ago.  A few of us climbed the front side of Lewis Peak.  We gained something like 3500' in about 2.7 miles.  Portions were at a grade of 2000'/mile, so it was a pretty good scramble. 

Bj, Jon, and Ryan scrambling up a steeper section

Ben Lomond Peak from the top of Lewis Peak

The last pitch before the summit

So, here's the week of  December 2nd progress.

Sunday - Didn't do squat except stuff around the house that needed to get done.

Monday - Got up early and headed for the aquatic center to get a run in on the track.  Tough to do when I have farm chores to do at 5am.  Managed to get a run in a lunch time as well, although it was on the treadmill.  Miles - 8.0

Tuesday - Got up early again and headed for the aquatic center.  This time I swam about 800 yards.  Went back at lunch to get a run in on the dreadmill again.  This evening I went to Pilates, so triple workout day.  If that doesn't get me into shape, nothing will.  Miles - 8.0

Wednesday - Found out that my quads were a bit tired and sore from yesterday's Pilates session.  My teacher will be pleased to hear that.  Got up and hit the aquatic center for a run.  Even though the legs were a bit tired and sore, I managed to get in about four miles at a pretty good pace.  Since I don't time it I can only guess at my pace, but it seemed to be down around 8:00-8:30.

Thursday - Swam another 1000 yards in the morning, then ran 4 miles at lunch.  Miles - 4.0

Friday - Took the day off.  Didn't do squat.

Saturday - ran from 22nd street.  Had big plans to go about 7 miles.  Didn't where warm enough clothes and turned around at inspiration point.  Managed to get in about 3.6.  Miles - 3.6

Breaking news, I'm now signed up for the Bryce 100.  Still crossing my fingers on Wasatch.

Week of October 28

I haven't posted in a couple weeks mainly due to the fact that my lovely wife underwent major back surgery shortly after our Zion trip.  It was a planned surgery as she has had back pain for years.  She ended up with a L4-L5 fusion. 
Since I was getting kind of burnt out with running, I figured that taking a bit of time off to take care of her post surgery would be a good thing to do, and it has been.  I dropped out of the Ogden Valley 50 mile, and did no running at all the week of her surgery. 
I'm happy to say that now less than two weeks post surgery, she is doing great.  She's out walking around the neighborhood, and generally feeling better.  It'll be a full year of recovery, but as time goes on, she'll be able to pick up more and more activites.  No snowboarding or horsey riding for the winter, but by next spring she should be back in action for the most part.
Meanwhile, I've started running again this week, but only during lunch.  Having her family here is a big help, but they go home this weekend.

Sunday - Didn't do any running at all.

 Monday - Ran at lunch.  Did my usual five mile route down the bike path.  Felt good to get back out running, but I did feel a bit sluggish.  Miles - 5.0

Tuesday - Went out again at lunch.  Gorgeous day, near 70.  Tried pushing a little bit.  Wanted to keep the average pace at least under nine minutes.  Manage to do that, but not by much.  Went to Pilates tonight.  I could tell I hadn't been there in a week, it was kind of tough.  Miles - 5.0

Wednesday - Went out again at lunch.  Record high temps.  Went the other direction down the bike path today.  Miles - 4.9

Thursday - Went on an older route that I used to do all the time.  Managed to keep the pace below 8:30 today.  I actually felt pretty good, not stiff, not tired.  Miles - 5.2

Friday - Was going to go after work from Rainbow north, but when I got to the trailhead, I thought "nope, just not into it today" and went home.  I usually enjoy running by myself, but today I kind of wanted someone to run with.  Oh well.  Miles - 0.0

Saturday - Didn't run at all.  The first training run for the Buffalo Run was today, but I didn't make it.  Instead, I spent the day cleaning house, doing laundry, and generally getting stuff done around the house now that guests are gone.  Felt good to get a bunch of stuff done, but I did feel a bit guilty for not running.  I got over it pretty quick though.  I'm still not ready to get back into the training thing yet.  I'm still doing Pilates, and running at lunch during the week, but weekend running isn't happening.  This has me a bit worried, but I'm sure once things settle down a bit, Karen gets more mobile and able to do things, that the bug will come back.  Meanwhile, I feel like I'm getting a bit fat.

Week of October 7 - Zion Traverse report

Sunday - Went for a short run with Juli Aistars, a friend from Illinos.  She was in town for a nursing conference and came out and ran the 50K.  She stayed at our home Saturday night and I took her on one of our favorite local runs, Rainbow north.  Gorgeous morning and she enjoyed it.  Miles - 6.1

Monday - Did a road run from home.  I've been trying to get a few more road miles in before the Ogden Valley 50 mile.  Not a big fan, but I can run faster on the roads.  Miles - 5.55

Tuesday - Same thing, ran on the road from home to Pilates class.  When ever I do that, the class seems to be just a bit harder.  Probably because I'm tired from the run.  Who knows?  Still, managed a consistent 9 minute pace the entire run.  That's what I'm looking for when I run ogden Valley.  If I can maintain a 9 minute pace for the first half and a 10 minute pace for the sceond half, I'll bee really happy.  Miles - 5.1

Wednesday - Ran at lunch today.  Ended up running to the bank.  Boring, but oh well.  Miles - 4.9

Thursday - Ran again at lunch.  Sigh!  Miles - 4.65

Friday - Drove to Zion National Park with Karen and her sister.  Happy Birthday to me!  Big time run tomorrow.  Miles - 0

Saturday - Zion traverse.  Love this run.  We did it last year and it was incredible.  This year was no different.  Several of us that went last year were up for the adventure again, plus several that hadn't run it before came along.  I think there were ten of us that made the complete trek. 
Friday it rained on us all the way down.  We knew that it would clear out so it wasn't really a worry as far as the run.
Saturday morning dawned at Lee Pass with the skies still somewhat cloudy and the cliffs and peaks wreathed in clouds.  Made for a spectacular sight.

Dawn at the Lee Pass trailhead

We managed to get started by about 7:30.  The trail was quite muddy in spots from the previous night's rain but it wasn't too bad.  The trail descends for about the first 1-2 miles along a small creek.  After that it begins to follow La Verkin creek upstream for the next 4-5 miles.  Once we started up La Verkin Creek, the mud pretty much went away and was replaced by wet sand and even wetter foliage.  The wet plants meant that my legs and shoes were soon soaked from the drips.  The temperature was in the 50's with no breeze, so it made for very pleasant running.

We were having a great time along this section, goofing around, taking pictures, shooting video, and just enjoying the scenery.  Definitely awe inspiring.

Sunrise

 

After about six miles, we had to cross the creek.  That made for some interesting jumps trying to keep our wet feet dry. 

 

 

After the creek crossing we made the climb to the Hop Valley riverbed.  This is a cool part of the run.  With the flat riverbed plus cliffs on either side, it's a total Jurrasic Park moment, especially when the range cattle moo and it echoes off of the canyon walls.  As we went up the riverbed, Aric tried to befriend one of the steers, named it "Dinner" and tried to pet it.  The steer wasn't having any part of that.

Dinner

 

Most everyone was trying to avoid getting their feet wet by hoping back and forth across the meandering stream.  I figured that my feet were already wet, so why not take the direct route.  I went straight up the riverbed, in the water.  Since it was only a few inches deep, that wasn't a problem.

 

 

 

Eventually we made it to the Hop Valley Trailhead where Kathleen and Shane were waiting for us with supplies and water.  After about a half hour stop, we took off.  The lead group of Harrison, Jon, and Jared left the rest of us behind.  Meanwhile, Aric, Shawn, Breein,a nd I stuck together for the rest of the journey, while Ryan, Lindsay, and Alicia brought up the rear.

Clouds were still hanging around as we went through the pine forest towards Wildcat Canyon, but we did notice the temperature seemed to be warmer than last year.  We thought we'd be getting into the clouds in Wildcat Canyon, but by the time we got there, they had cleared out and we could see the scenery.

 

Wildcat Canyon

After Wildcat Canyon, we continued up the trail and reached Horse Pasture Plateau.  This plateau sits at about 7500' and is pretty flat.  By now we were more than halfway done and were making pretty reasonable time.  We took a break at the same place we did last year. 

 

 

Enjoying the view

At this point, the rest of the journey is either flat or downhill.  There is a couple of short uphills, but they aren't any big deal.  The first downhill took us into Potato Hollow, while the next uphill took us on to the West Rim Trail.  This trail at times follows right along the edge of the plateau with a cliff just a few feet away.  Makes for an interesting part of the run.  Just before we began the main descent to the valley floor, we were treated to a couple more spectacular views.

 

 

 

 

The descent itself is pretty interesting.  The trail is cut right into the side of the cliff and has concrete left over from the days of the Civilian Conservation Corps back in the 1930's. 

 

As you head down, you see towering cliffs, water seeps coming right out of the cliffs, and all sorts of interesting things.

 

Aric trying for a glamour shot at the bridge

Eventually, we made our way to the trail junciton for Angel's Landing.  Here we got our first look at the valley floor well over a thousand feet below.

Yeah, its' a long ways down

 

As we made our way down, we get to go through"Walter's Wiggles".  This is a set of small switchbacks, that are cut into the cliffside.  Here's where we started to encounter all of the day tourists that were coming back down from Angel's Landing.  We get some odd looks when we go running by.

Walter's Wiggles

The finish at the bottom of this trail.

We managed to finish the run at around 7pm.  A little bit quicker than last year.  No one was waiting for us, so we hopped on the tram and headed for the park entrance.  As we were waiting, we were questioned by a few people.  They found it amazing that we had run across the park in one day.

It was a great day for an epic run

When we got to the visitor center, Jared was waiting for us.  The first group had finished about an hour earlier.

Now it was time for the festivities.  We all met at Zion Pizza and Noodle for dinner.  Karen had brought birthday cupcakes and I drank too much beer.  We managed to close the place down, having a great time in the process.  Thankfully there are no pictures from this part of the day.

The next day, we all met for breakfast, then most everyone headed for home.  Karen, Kate (her sister), and I stayed for most of the day did a couple of the short hikes.  Since we didn't get to do this last year, it was nice to see some other parts of the park.

 

So yeah, a good time was had by all and we're talking about a double traverse next year.  I figure that would take about 24 hours.  That would be interesting to say the least.

Here's the GPS track of our route.  http://app.strava.com/runs/25119927

 



Week of September 30

Sunday - Didn't run at all.  When I got home Saturday evening, my lovely wife told me "you're mine tomorrow, we're going out for breakfast then going for a horsey ride.  Well, that' exactly what we did, and had a good time.  It was a great day for a ride.  we ended up going out to the island and moseying around the White Rock loop.  I think we were the only ones with horses out there that day.  About half a mile from the trailhead, we had a mountain bike come up on us from behind.  Spooked the horses since he didn't give any warning.  Idiot!  Needless to say I had some choice words with him regarding trail manners.  At least our horses are used to mountain bikes, so they weren't too spooked.  Come on bikers, yield to horses and people on foot.  Miles - 0.0

Monday - I did manage to get out for a few miles.  Ran from Rainbow north a couple of times, once by myself, once with Breein.  Perfect day for a run, warm, but not hot.  Miles - 10.1

Tuesday - Went out for a lunch run.  Went to the bank as well.  Figure I might as well run an errand.  didn't go out after work.  With the 50K/100K this weekend, I still have a bunch of stuff to do.  Miles - 4.8

Wednesday - Didn't do any running.  Had plenty to do with getting ready for the race this Saturday so I decided to take the day off.  Mile - 0.0

Thursday - Did a lunchtime run.  Weather was perfect, high 60's sunny.  Really nice.  Ended up just kind of taking it easy.  Miles - 5.0

Friday - Spent the day out on Antelope Island marking the course and setting up for the 50K/100K.  The weather was perfect, winds light to non-existant, temps in the 60's.  Way better than last year's howling winds and riving snow.  Had Britta and Nick help set up and we were pretty much done, organized and sitting around enjoying the quiet and drinking beer by 4:30.  I love it when  plan comes together.  We all spent the night out there and while I didn't get much sleep, it was a quiet night.  The couple of times I got up and went out of the tent, the stars were amazing.  It certainly didn't get as cold as it was supposed to, probably into the low 40's.  Miles - 0.0

Saturday - Crazy busy.  Got up at 3:30am to get coffee going and await the first of the runners showing up to run teh 100K.  I only had 17 this year vs. the 50 I had two years ago.  With those kind of numbers, I may drop the 100K option next year.  I can't quite justify having two dozen volunteers stay on the island until well after dark when I only have a dozen runners.  I do think that I lost a fair number of runners this year due to three things.  First, Saturday was the St. George marathon.  I know I lost a bunch to that race.  Second, it was one week after the Bear 100, I know I lost a few because of that race.  Third, I lost the Idaho crowd because of the IMTUF 100 the same day.  So next year I'm going to put the race off one more week into October and see what happens.
Still, everyone seemed to have a good time.  I was certainly cleaned out of beer by the end of the day.  Several HUMR's ran the 50K and did well.
The last 100K runner crossed the finish line at 10:25pm, well after the 10pm cutoff, but no big deal.  We had everything broken down and off the island by 11pm.
Next up, our Zion traverse next Saturday.  Looking forward to it.

Miles for the week - 20.9