I have lost a good amount of weight this year and on the trails I have noticed myself feeling stronger, getting faster, and breaking PRs. Here’s a few recent ones. A few weeks ago I went out for a street run in the evening and accidentally got a 10k PR of 53:32. This accidental PR made me curious, so the next week I went back out and tried to go faster. I did, clocking a 51:01 10k PR. I am…
I have been doing my best to seduce a new neighbor (kind of old family friend) to the trails. So far, pretty good. I have taken him up the Lindon Squiggles, around the BST, the Dry Canyon – Altar/Rock Pile loop, the Johnsons Hole / Taj Mahal / GW loop, etc. Good times. I still struggle to believe all of these great trails are just a 5 minute drive away. >
I grew up snowboarding in NW Washington and had never skied. However, lots of my trailrunning friends have been posting pictures of backcountry ski-touring. I couldn’t let them have all the fun so I hunted on the used classifieds and put together a pretty good set-up. Some Surface Sherpa skis with dynafit speed turn tech bindings, some La Sportiva sparkle tech boots, and some G3 skins. So, before I knew it, I was skinning up Sq Peak road and…
Snow has arrived (finally!) in Utah. I have only ventured out a few times, but it has been pretty great. In mid-November my back tweaked again (see my nightmare injury from Summer 2015). I decided to test it out on the Lindon Squiggles and foothills below Dry Canyon. It started beautiful and ended with a whiteout. I knew a system was moving in, but figured I’d be ok not venturing too far from my car. It was fun to get…
I’ve said it before, but I really am pleased as punch with the easy access and quality of some of my backyard local trails. 3-5 minute drive to a trailhead and I can put in as few or as many easy miles as I want around the foothills. Add a canyon in for some elevation, or just putter around the Bonneville Shoreline Trail and countless offshoots. Here’s 3 recent ones. I took another friend out for his first trailrun with…
Barring catastrophic weather, bad falls, rolled ankles or other injuries, getting attacked by wild animals, etc., even the worst trail-run is still pretty great. The BST and squiggly wiggly trails above Orem/Lindon (especially between Dry Creek and Battle Creek) are kind of my treadmill. A little vert, a little technical single track, some flat sections to really open up and run. A bit of everything. The trails aren’t spectacular, although the sunsets, alpenglow, tall grass (in the Spring) are sometimes…
In hopes of rehabbing my IT Bands and increasing my flat-terrain endurance and speed, I have stayed off the trails for a couple weeks. (I want to be injury-free and flat-fast for my fundraiser on January 1 – read about it here to help Syrian refugees). One treadmill run and 3 on paved trails around my house. The treadmill was horrible. The ones around my house were convenient and actually somewhat enjoyable…but I missed the mountains. It is entertaining to…
A nice headlamp run up the Lindon Squiggles. I made it about 30 minutes without the headlamp, but once I got up into some small stands of trees it got pitch dark. I forgot how creepy it can be up there. Then, as I crossed the parking lot at Dry Canyon, a guy warned me about a rattler he heard near the trailhead. Sure enough, there it was in the middle of the trail. It was my first sighting this…
Thankfully, the back pain from last month did not return and I was able to fit in a number of runs and hikes (not listed here, but on Strava) during the remainder of August. I ran a bigger version of the squiggly wiggly. Lots of fun. Some HOT BST action: An awesome morning run up Grove Creek to Chris Flats. Bagged my first Mountain Goat sighting. I even ran some pavement. Possibly the first time this year! Actually, it was…
With muscle relaxants doing their work, I was advised to try some easy slow runs. The Dr. didn’t have to ask me twice! Thursday I hit the some Orem/Lindon BST. It was great to get out and move, but I did it in the heat of the day and the temps really got to me! Feeling good, I tried a new place on Friday – up Provo Canyon and to Big Springs, on the backside of the Cascade Ridge. I…