More Draper Trails

Due to the wind and snow this morning, Leslie Peterson and I bagged our plans to run in Park City and instead met up at the Draper City Park. We did an out and back for a total of 7 miles on the Draper Canal Trails. I did one or two miles on the equestrian trails to get some trail time in. It was snowing pretty well and the trail got a bit icy at times. I was glad I had on my hobnail running shoes.

Leslie called it quits at 7 miles and I continued around the park. I had seen a new trail at the back of the park that I wanted to investigate. I was prepared to run another three miles at the most. The new trail is called the Willow Creek Trail. Guess what – it parallels what I think must be Willow Creek. The trail runs between subdivisions on the one side and farms on the other. The paved path only lasted about .75 miles and then I went a little bit further on a concrete trail that seemed to be petering out. Turned around and headed back to the jeep. It seemed to be getting colder and I was glad to be done. Nice to get in 9.25 miles on a snowy and cold day.

Dimple Dell Parkway

On Saturday, January 14^th, I took a long run down to the paved Trax trail and then over to the Dimple Dell Parkway.

Every time I run it I think back to the first time I hiked this trail. I don't think we had moved to Utah yet from Illinois, but it was near my sister's house in Sandy and I went hiking there. Totally blistered my shoulders and love the quick ability to get away from the city without leaving the city.

I need to run these trails more. This last week I did a few short stints on the DDP.

Entered the parkway by the Trax station and headed East. I ran up until the big hill for the culvert/tunnel under 1300 East. I have to admit I have never actually run under the road on 700 East. I always went up to the park and over the road and down – I guess I hadn't realized it was possible.

It was a sunny day. I'm not sure it was particularly warm, but down in the gully it got fairly warm with all my layers on and I ended up running with just my lower layers and then down to a long sleeved running shirt on top. After I started down the hill from 1300 East back to 700 East I had one of those magical moments. I don't get them very often – and love them when they occur. Even though I was already 5 or 6 miles into my run, things just flowed. For one beautiful mile I was not tired and running was smooth and a total joy. I didn't have this feeling most (if not all of last year) and it was great. These moments make all the hard training moments worthwhile.

Ended up with almost ten miles on my run. It was a lot colder when I got back on 7^th East and I had to put all the layers back on. I was sure glad it was a sunny day out. So were all of the bicyclists that passed me.

It's been a weird winter – but I can't say that I have minded the ability to get on trails still in January.

New Year’s Revolution Run

Leslie Petersen convinced me to sign up for the New Year's Revolution Run. This race was held on the track around the speed skating track at the Olympic Ice Oval in Kearns. I have run there plenty, but this was my first race at this location.

The group that put the race on (this was its first year) was hoping for 500 runners. I was hoping they wouldn't meet that goal because that is a lot of bodies on a fairly small track and would have been very crowded. Luckily only about 250 people registered.

Another running friend, Rachel Moody, was really bummed because she broke her right foot the day or two before Christmas and was 13 miles short of her running goal of 2011 miles in 2011. I encouraged her to find a knee scooter and one of her neighbors had one that she could borrow – so she ended up coming after all.

We picked up our packets around 7 a.m. on December 31^st. Back to the old style leg chip to count laps, but I brought along my lap counter because I wanted to know how many laps I had done. My goal was somewhere between 16-20 miles in the four hours the race would be open. The purpose was to see how many laps you could run in a four hour period.

Shortly after 8 a.m. the race started and the gerbil imitation got going. I was passed a lot, but also passed other people. For the first hour I pretty well ran non-stop except for one lap walking with Rachel. She was using a lot of new muscles on the scooter and would scoot several laps and then walk a lap to give her muscles a break. I thought it very admirable that she was even trying to get her mileage in.

I'd say hi to Leslie each time I passed her and we would usually run a lap together (or walk it later on). After the first hour I would run 4 laps, then walk a lap and each hour I dropped the number of laps prior to walking. I could feel the hard surface of the track tightening up my back as the time dragged on, but kept on as best I could.

It was interesting to watch Seth Wold run by me constantly in his Altra's. He ended up doing something like 115 laps – incredible! When I mentioned prior to the race that I had two pairs of Altra's – he gave me a shirt and I wore it during the race.

Other than two long bathroom breaks for stomach issues, I kept going the entire time. Ran the last 30 minutes in socks to give my feet a break from shoes. I ended up with 63 laps for a total of 18 miles. Nice way to end out the running year.