Oct 23- 18 miles blacktop bike path
Oct 26- 18 miles blacktop roads
Oct 27- 12 miles on C&O towpath
Oct 29- 13 miles trail, bikepath, road, sidewalk you name it
Today's run was a new loop exploring the amazing area I now live in. I started from my townhouse and ran hilly roads to a trail that connects into the Potomac heritage trail, that connected to the Chain bridge, then ran the C&O towpath to the Capital crescent bikepath, to the bike/pedestrian path and sidewalks linking me to the Memorial bridge. I crossed the GW parkway then ran the mt Vernon trail north to Roosevelt island and then got on the Potomac Heritage trail again and ran it to a connector trail before finishing my run up Quincy blvd. a sweat loop. I got to go (closely)by the Lincoln monument, Georgetwon, Kennedy center, Watergate bldg, Arlington National Cemetery. What a nice tour.
Next up...MMTR 50 er.....53 miler is coming up Saturday!
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Friday, October 24, 2008
Urban Assault Ultra
Okay this is my next dream. Now that I am living in Arlington I am surrounded by an amazing network of within the city trails. Some dirt, some gravel/crushed stone, some paved bike path. My biggest impression is that they are everywhere!
Some fo the trails I have explored completely in the last month include:
W&OD- paved- rails to trails- 45miles
Potomaac Heritage Trail- dirt- rocky nasty-18 miles
Capital Crescent Trail- paved-13 miles
Mt Vernon Trail- paved-18 miles
4 mile- run Trail -paved-7.5 miles
Custis Trail- paved- 4 miles
Bluemont Connector- paved- 2 miles
The above culminated with yesterdays cool run. Here from Garmin. Its called the Arlington triangle loop and it took me 2:39 to cover these 18 miles. I did get a little lost where the trails don't quite connect, but they are currently pooring concrete and bulldozing to make them do so as I type.
Previously I have run a series of connecting trails linking rock creek park to battery kimbal and grover archibald allowing me to run dirt from walter Reed's 16th street entrance all the way to fletchers boathouse and the C&O Canal. As well as running the bike path system thru rock creek- which is 20 miles long
Other area trails include the grandaddy of them all the C&O canal towpath = 184 miles
A great resource is linked here
My plan is to one day lay out a route that allows a completely urban trail ultra of 50+ miles. With all the above choices it shouldn't be to hard! It looks like you could start/finish at Fletchers boathouse and do a figure 8 loop into rock creek park connectinginto the crescent trail run south to the C& O then into the Arlington triangle loop and it'd be close to 50. hmmmmmmm
Monday, October 6, 2008
I'm Not Dead
Really, I'm not it has just been a REALLY long time since I had Internet and felt like posting.
Life: Things are going well! Anne and I are now in the new townhouse and living large in Arlington. We both are working and the cat and dog continue to attack one another to stay amused.
Joey- the cat is not thrilled about the city life and having to stay inside, but he does now have 4 levels to run around on and perhaps more importantly....find hiding places.
Oskar- the dog is happy about everything as a general rule. He now enjoys city block walks and having to have his master pick up his (Oskar's) poop..... Who is really the master anyway?
In my running life I must admit I don't do well with change and living in strange places and having odd schedules and traveling a ton and having a million new duties that I always seem to deem more important than running. Thus my last 4 weeks since leaving Richmond have been all in the 24-38 mile range. Wow sucko!
Anne's running has been going well and we have successfully done long ones of 15, 18, and 20 miles in this time span. She is averaging 30 miles a week now... You go Anne!
A return to normalcy?? Well sort of. I managed 4 runs last week ( an 8 and a 20 with Anne) and a 10 on the C&O towpath.....which I think is my favorite place to run ever. And a whopping 45 miler. The later being the VHTRC's Andiamo run which covers the entire W&OD bike path trail from Purcelville into Shirlington. This was loads of fun for the first 34 miles. Then the last 11 took over 3 hours and resulted in my first bouts of running induced vomiting in over 20 years of running. Pretty amazing GI tract killing pain honestly. Lasted well into the night keeping me up and out of bed from 1-3AM even.
If all ultras were like the first 30 (50k split in 4:58 running easy with 60sec walk breaks at all mile markers) I'd run ultras every few days. If all ultras were like the last 10 miles. I'd never run one again.
Life: Things are going well! Anne and I are now in the new townhouse and living large in Arlington. We both are working and the cat and dog continue to attack one another to stay amused.
Joey- the cat is not thrilled about the city life and having to stay inside, but he does now have 4 levels to run around on and perhaps more importantly....find hiding places.
Oskar- the dog is happy about everything as a general rule. He now enjoys city block walks and having to have his master pick up his (Oskar's) poop..... Who is really the master anyway?
In my running life I must admit I don't do well with change and living in strange places and having odd schedules and traveling a ton and having a million new duties that I always seem to deem more important than running. Thus my last 4 weeks since leaving Richmond have been all in the 24-38 mile range. Wow sucko!
Anne's running has been going well and we have successfully done long ones of 15, 18, and 20 miles in this time span. She is averaging 30 miles a week now... You go Anne!
A return to normalcy?? Well sort of. I managed 4 runs last week ( an 8 and a 20 with Anne) and a 10 on the C&O towpath.....which I think is my favorite place to run ever. And a whopping 45 miler. The later being the VHTRC's Andiamo run which covers the entire W&OD bike path trail from Purcelville into Shirlington. This was loads of fun for the first 34 miles. Then the last 11 took over 3 hours and resulted in my first bouts of running induced vomiting in over 20 years of running. Pretty amazing GI tract killing pain honestly. Lasted well into the night keeping me up and out of bed from 1-3AM even.
If all ultras were like the first 30 (50k split in 4:58 running easy with 60sec walk breaks at all mile markers) I'd run ultras every few days. If all ultras were like the last 10 miles. I'd never run one again.
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