Monday
Did: rest
Tuesday
Did: 6.2 mi treadmill run
This was painful - quads were super sore from Sunday. Took it pretty slow, did a little interval work, but not too fast.
Wednesday
Did: rest
Thursday
Did: rest
Friday
Did: rest
Saturday
Did: rest
I mean why change now?
Sunday
Did: 25.01 mi trail run
EPIC RUN DAY. I headed up to Dupont in the morning, got started just a few mins before 8:30am. First plan was to run loops around Burnt Mtn and Cedar/Big Rock. I checked the Shoals to see if they were crossable... definitely better than a few weeks ago, but I wasn't in the mood to get my feet wet this early in the game. I'd assumed that would be the case, so I had a different route planned.
Crossable... but not with dry feet.
I think not running all week made my legs feel a little stiff & heavy to start out with. I walked a bit on the climbs going up Burnt, but told myself it was OK to take it easy since today was about mileage.
 |
| Rock face crossing |
 |
| Climbing up Cedar Rock trail |
I made it to the top of Cedar Rock to the intersection with Big Rock Trail at just over an hour into the run, and I still hadn't seen a single person.
 |
| Junction |
Took a little break when I got to the beautiful views from Big Rock before heading down.
 |
| 😍 |
That was Part 1: Rock Face Views. Total of 6.8 miles in about 1.5 hours. Next... Tour de Waterfalls!
Because of the water crossing, the only way to connect over to other parts of the forest was via Longside > Pine Tree > Sheep Mountain trails which spits out onto the road right near the main Visitor's Center and the very crowded/popular hikes to all of the waterfalls. This is where most of the tourists go. I did not enjoy Sheep Mountain because apparently not many people run/ride it, so it's a pretty rough trail. I did see some wild turkeys who sprinted away from me down the trail.
I finally made it to the Visitors Center and started making my way around to each of the 4 waterfalls of Dupont. There are 3 close together...
1 - High Falls
2 - Triple Falls
This one is cool because the viewing location is between two of the 3 sections...
Two sections above... and section below.
3 - Hooker Falls
And finally, 4 - Bridal Veil Falls
This one was farther away and took a couple of miles on the forest service roads to reach.
By the time I'd finished up at Bridal Veil, I was close to 16 miles and 3:15 into the run. Less than 10 miles to go! Now I pretty much just had to make it back to the Corn Mill Shoals parking lot and make up whatever remaining distance with the last short loop of trails available from that lot.
I started my trek back and decided on an extra climb up to the Airstrip Trail - this completed the "best views/sites in Dupont" tour!
I found my way back through the crowds of people at the Visitor's Center before the climb back up Sheep Mountain.
 |
| I did not like Sheep Mountain. |
The last miles were a bit of a struggle... my legs were DONE and I did a lot of walking. Thankfully, aside from getting up Sheep Mtn. there wasn't a lot of climbing remaining. I calculated that I would get back to the car with just about 1.5 miles to go, so I took a right on to Twixt and crossed the road onto Rock Quarry > Micajah > Wilke for the final mile. I had to run one lap around the parking lot to get to 25, but halleluia, I did it!
I quickly changed into comfy clothes and chugged the chocolate milk I had waiting for me.
 |
| Had been dreaming about this for miles! |
Final result:
25.01 miles - 5:10 Moving time - 5:52 Elapsed time - 3,600 ft elevation gain - 2,200 calories burned
 |
| Whew. |
So, short on overall distance for the week but 1) it was a recovery week and 2) I got that long run in. I think mentally I needed the break, too, from running almost every day of the week. Now I'm in for a 3 week taper (at least based on the weekend runs) until race day!
No comments:
Post a Comment