Friday, I went out to the trail to shoot some footage for the final installment of my Tanawha trail updates to send to the WNC Trail Runner group. Conditions didn't seem like they would be that bad if we would have ran that day. Instead, after getting back to my place in Boone, the bottom fell out and we were covered in 3 inches of snow in less than an hour! And it was forecasted to continue dumping all the way through Saturday afternoon. Things were not looking good for the inaugural running of the Tanawha Trail Marathon, Half, & 50k. All Friday night I was getting emails informing me that those who planned to run were bailing. By Saturday morning, the number of committed runners dropped from 20 to 6. I cannot blame them either, the roads to the trail were super nasty and the conditions were burly. Only Adam Hill, Doug Blackford, Dennis Norris, Scott Williams, Allen Meyer, and myself were crazy enough to go out and face these conditions head on.
There was no way that I would be making it out to the trail in my car, so I walked over to the Sun Inn to meet Adam and wait for Scott to come pick us up in his girlfriends all-wheel drive Subaru. I definitely will be investing in one of those in the future. It was a beast in the snow. The roads made for slow going but we eventually made it out to the trail by 9:30. I had been debating on running in my jacket or not the whole drive to the trail and eventually I decided to wear it. A decision I would regret the first 8 miles and one I would love the last 5-6.
We actually started the run from Holloway Mt Rd. just under the parkway instead of the official start at Price Lake. This really didn't make for much of a mile difference (only about half a mile less) and it would keep us off the unplowed parkway. After the first initial mile on the road, Adam, Scott, and I all began to separate once on the trail. Obviously, I was the slow one in this group and quickly fell behind the others. I started to get into a funk during this lonesome running period. The snow was dumping like crazy, and I was getting no grip in the 6-8 inch powdery snow. I thought that putting on my micro-spikes would afford me better traction, which it did, but they continued to slide off my shoe when catching a root or rock. So I was constantly stopping to adjust my spikes, still slipping all over the trail, and when I went to get a sip of water from my camel pack, the bit valve was frozen over. All of this, including me trying to catch up with everyone else (Doug, Dennis, & Allen who started ahead of us, but a bit slower) I was hating the world and the trail. I knew that as soon as I would catch up with Doug, Dennis, & Allen I would be in a much better mood.
After about an hour of running, neglecting my needs for calories, I finally caught Doug & Dennis. And sure enough, my mood completely changed and I was finally ready to run for an extended period of time. They were having the same problems with traction as I was, so at least I wasn't the only one. It was nice running with them, and considering the conditions weren't letting up, I decided that I would run with them the rest of the day. Soon, we caught up with Adam who waiting for us ahead (Scott had fell behind looking for his lost water bootle). We all decided to stick to together and run the trail all the way to Raven Rocks (8.5 miles in) and then hit the parkway and run the 5-6 miles back to the cars. Everyone was pretty satisfied with this decision. The trail past Raven Rocks gets extremely technical and would have been very dangerous in these conditions.
Before we headed down the parkway, we all tried to rehydrate and fuel up for the return trip. It started getting really cold, especially since we were now exposed to the vicious wind on parkway. Something we had only heard while running on the trail, which sheltered us with the thick forest and rhododendron. There was a good 8 inches of snow on the parkway all the way back to the cars. But at least it was all down hill from Raven Rocks. Being exposed to the wind made me appreciate my jacket and I was glad I was wearing it. My legs began to feel very heavy on the way down the parkway, probably due to the extra weight of the spikes and snow accumulating around my ankles. It was just hard for me to push though and run the whole section, but I did.
Upon arrival to the cars, we noticed that Scott wasn't there and we hoped that he would follow our tracks back down the parkway. Adam and I decided to run down to the start with Doug, Dennis, and Allen and hoped that Scott would make it back to our car by the time we came back. Adam chose to run back, I decided to hitch a ride with Doug.
When we got back to the car, Scott was waiting for us. He never found his bottle, but did follow our tracks back down the parkway and was thankful for this as the rest of us were. We all ended up running for about 3.5 hours. We only covered about 13-14 miles during that time. That gives you an idea about how slow going it was out there.
We all meet at Canyon's afterward and enjoyed some tasty grub and brew before parting ways back to our warm homes. This was by far the craziest, most extreme, and most epic run of my life. Even though it was on a section of trail I have run numerous times. The conditions were by far the most extreme I had ever ran in. None of us ended up doing are respective distance for the inaugural running of the Tanawha Trail Runs but we had a great time still. Hopefully the conditions next year will be better and everyone will be able to make it out to this amazing run!
Here is a vid I put together of the run:
Sunday, January 9, 2011
Friday, January 7, 2011
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Stone Mountain State Park to Devil's Garden Overlook via MST
Wow! This week has been pretty intense for me even though my mileage and vertical gain was minuscule (50m & 7k ft). Lets just say that I want be doing 3 tempo runs in one week again. But the week did end really good even though my body wasn't feeling that great. I met up with some friends from Winston-Salem (everyone from the Hanging Rock snow run plus some new faces) and we headed up to Stone Mountain State Park to charge up the the Mountains-to-Sea trail (a.k.a. MST) from the park to the Blue Ridge Parkway at Devil's Garden Overlook and then hammer the trail back down to the cars. It would be 6 miles up and then 6 miles down.
After an hour drive and some good conversation with John, we arrived at the starting point for our 12 mile adventure. We all piled out of our cars and
made final preparations with our gear and then took off. The first mile of the trail was a wide gravel road that criss-crossed a stream until you turned off the gravel and onto dirt double-track. This also marks the brutal climbing that lay before us and the first mile of it is the worse! Abran had told me last night that most of the climbing was around a 10% grade. He was right other than this first hill which was more like 25%!!! Needless to say, I was walking this section even though Abran and John kept 
pushing through it somehow. After the first initial climb though it was at or just above 10% the rest of the way and I was able to run the rest of the climb. I really enjoyed this climb because it was almost entirely soft double-track dirt. It helped cushion a lot of impact on the short down hill sections, which were hurting me less after Friday's blasting down Moore's Knob at Hanging Rock State Park. I could definitely tell after 
the first initial climb that my body still hadn't recovered from that day and it showed as Abran and John blazed by me. I was still having a great time though and the weather was perfect. After about each mile, Abran would wait up for me to catch up and then blaze on up the trail ahead of me again, which he pretty much repeated the entire day. It was fine with me because it helped me stay on the trail and have someone to run with for a little while, even if it was only about 30 seconds. Haha. With about a mile to go to the turn around, I finally mustered up enough strength to keep Abran behind and captured the moment with this picture to the left. This would be the only time today that I was taking the lead. After about two-thirds of a mile of gentle climbing we took a right onto the single-track trail that would lead us to Devil's Garden Overlook. We cruised down the trail and made it to the turn around in 1:11. But when we arrived there, we didn't see John who had been in front of us almost the entire climb. He must have missed the turn and went straight. On the way back up, we ran into the rest of the group and asked if they had seen John or Derrien. They said that they hadn't so Abran and I decided that we would make a short look for them. After about half a mile of going down the suspected trail they were on, we decided that we would go ahead and turn back to go to the car. We were sure that they would realize there mistake and would make it back ok.
The steep descent back to the car wasn't to bad because of the soft footing, but my body still did not want to respond to the demand I was placing on it so the going was quite slow. I passed a few hikers out on this beautiful day and said a quick "hello" and went on my way.
All I could think about was that last hard descent down to the gravel road and how bad it was going to hurt. It didn't end up being that bad and I met Abran at the bottom and we both started waiting for everyone else to come in. Sure enough, less than 5 minutes later John came cruising down the hill. We asked him what happened and sure enough he missed the turn, came back up, met Derrien, went back down the wrong trail, and then him and Derrien decided to turn around and take it home minus Devil's Garden Overlook. I think Abran's face in this picture says it all regarding our reaction to this quite humorous story.
Everyone eventually showed up and we took it back to the cars. Everyone's
day was finished except mine and I contemplated not running any more. I wanted to try and get in around 22 miles today but I just didn't know if my body could take it. After about 20 minutes of eating and conversing in the parking lot I decided that I would at least go up to Wolf Rock and check it out. Apparently, Wolf Rock and Cedar Rock warranted pretty good views of the surrounding peaks and Stone Mountain. This would add about another 4.5 miles on the day for a total of 18.1. Definitely not 22 miles, but more than 13.1. So, I said my goodbye's to everyone and drove to the Wolf Rock trailhead, because it would have been another two miles of pavement otherwise.
My energy on the climb up to Wolf Rock was solid after eating quite a bit at the parking area, but the residual soreness in my legs was still there. So again, more slow going. As I reached Wolf Rock and Cedar Rock I was awarded with great views represented in these two pictures.
I'm glad I decided to tack on these few extra miles. The views were worth it! Stone Mountain is so unique and the views of the Blue Ridge were outstanding.
Well, after dragging my body back to the car it was time to head back to Boone for the school year. But before school starts, I've got one more big run. The Tanawha Marathon, Half, & 50k! This is a fun run I am throwing with the WNC Trail Runner group, so if you haven't checked it out do so now and send me and RSVP if you want to join!
After an hour drive and some good conversation with John, we arrived at the starting point for our 12 mile adventure. We all piled out of our cars and
made final preparations with our gear and then took off. The first mile of the trail was a wide gravel road that criss-crossed a stream until you turned off the gravel and onto dirt double-track. This also marks the brutal climbing that lay before us and the first mile of it is the worse! Abran had told me last night that most of the climbing was around a 10% grade. He was right other than this first hill which was more like 25%!!! Needless to say, I was walking this section even though Abran and John kept 
pushing through it somehow. After the first initial climb though it was at or just above 10% the rest of the way and I was able to run the rest of the climb. I really enjoyed this climb because it was almost entirely soft double-track dirt. It helped cushion a lot of impact on the short down hill sections, which were hurting me less after Friday's blasting down Moore's Knob at Hanging Rock State Park. I could definitely tell after 
the first initial climb that my body still hadn't recovered from that day and it showed as Abran and John blazed by me. I was still having a great time though and the weather was perfect. After about each mile, Abran would wait up for me to catch up and then blaze on up the trail ahead of me again, which he pretty much repeated the entire day. It was fine with me because it helped me stay on the trail and have someone to run with for a little while, even if it was only about 30 seconds. Haha. With about a mile to go to the turn around, I finally mustered up enough strength to keep Abran behind and captured the moment with this picture to the left. This would be the only time today that I was taking the lead. After about two-thirds of a mile of gentle climbing we took a right onto the single-track trail that would lead us to Devil's Garden Overlook. We cruised down the trail and made it to the turn around in 1:11. But when we arrived there, we didn't see John who had been in front of us almost the entire climb. He must have missed the turn and went straight. On the way back up, we ran into the rest of the group and asked if they had seen John or Derrien. They said that they hadn't so Abran and I decided that we would make a short look for them. After about half a mile of going down the suspected trail they were on, we decided that we would go ahead and turn back to go to the car. We were sure that they would realize there mistake and would make it back ok.The steep descent back to the car wasn't to bad because of the soft footing, but my body still did not want to respond to the demand I was placing on it so the going was quite slow. I passed a few hikers out on this beautiful day and said a quick "hello" and went on my way.
All I could think about was that last hard descent down to the gravel road and how bad it was going to hurt. It didn't end up being that bad and I met Abran at the bottom and we both started waiting for everyone else to come in. Sure enough, less than 5 minutes later John came cruising down the hill. We asked him what happened and sure enough he missed the turn, came back up, met Derrien, went back down the wrong trail, and then him and Derrien decided to turn around and take it home minus Devil's Garden Overlook. I think Abran's face in this picture says it all regarding our reaction to this quite humorous story.Everyone eventually showed up and we took it back to the cars. Everyone's
day was finished except mine and I contemplated not running any more. I wanted to try and get in around 22 miles today but I just didn't know if my body could take it. After about 20 minutes of eating and conversing in the parking lot I decided that I would at least go up to Wolf Rock and check it out. Apparently, Wolf Rock and Cedar Rock warranted pretty good views of the surrounding peaks and Stone Mountain. This would add about another 4.5 miles on the day for a total of 18.1. Definitely not 22 miles, but more than 13.1. So, I said my goodbye's to everyone and drove to the Wolf Rock trailhead, because it would have been another two miles of pavement otherwise.My energy on the climb up to Wolf Rock was solid after eating quite a bit at the parking area, but the residual soreness in my legs was still there. So again, more slow going. As I reached Wolf Rock and Cedar Rock I was awarded with great views represented in these two pictures.
I'm glad I decided to tack on these few extra miles. The views were worth it! Stone Mountain is so unique and the views of the Blue Ridge were outstanding. Well, after dragging my body back to the car it was time to head back to Boone for the school year. But before school starts, I've got one more big run. The Tanawha Marathon, Half, & 50k! This is a fun run I am throwing with the WNC Trail Runner group, so if you haven't checked it out do so now and send me and RSVP if you want to join!
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