Saturday was the 8th running of the C&O Canal 100 Mile. The course consists of 3 “loops” on the C&O Canal towpath starting from Camp Manidokan near Knoxvill, MD. The first loop is 38 miles followed by two 31 mile out-and-backs. The race starts with a small loop around the field where you park and…
2021 C&O Canal 100 Mile Preview
After 7 long months, it’s finally time to toe the line at another 100 mile race. C&O Canal was my first 100 miler back in 2015. It also ended up being my first DNF (mile 69). I went back in 2016, got my buckle, and pretty much decided never to go back. It wasn’t so…
Is It Working?
I seem to ask myself this fairly regularly as I progress through a training block. Is my training working? And my yardstick for measuring this 99 times out of a 100 is my pace. Unfortunately, my paces vary so much from day to day that it’s almost impossible for me to tell if I’m getting…
A Winter of 20 Milers: Complete
This morning I completed my Winter of 20 Milers project. Thirteen straight weekends of twenty mile training runs. It didn’t start to become a thing until I was part way into it. But once it was a thing? Oh, then it was on! The funny thing is that when I wrote my initial post on…
M-DT Trip Report – Maps 1&2
I was able to get out last Saturday and knock out maps 1 and 2 of the Mason-Dixon Trail thus completing the full trail. Overall, it took me 6 outings over almost 2 years to cover the entire distance from the Appalachian Trail to Chadds Ford. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was getting myself…
Desperate Times Call For Desperate Measures
Two months into the year and my first 3 ultras have now been cancelled. Phunt and HAT were no big deals, but NJ Devil 100 was going to be my first hundred in seven months and only my second in 15 months. I know, I know. We’re in the middle of a pandemic and while…
A Winter of 20 Milers
So I have this theory. I’ve shared it before so if you’re one of my two loyal readers, you’ve undoubtedly heard this a couple times before. My theory is that in order to get good at something, you need to do it. A lot. I’ve got this obsession with running really long distances so I’ve…
RIP Salming Trail T2s
First run: 12/1/18 Last run: 1/30/21 Total runs: 147 Total miles: 1,101 I got more miles out of these shoes than any other that I’ve owned. They probably should have been retired a couple hundred miles ago, but they weren’t bothering my feet too much so I kept them in the rotation. Today’s run put…
Building the Base
I have some big plans for the year. Between four hundreds and a 200 mile adventure, I have more on my plate than prior years. I don’t feel like any of these individually are beyond my abilities, but collectively they’ll take quite a bit of effort to accomplish. So I figure it was time to…
Love the Process
My alarm went off at 6am this morning and I really didn’t want to get up. During the week, I’m usually up and awake by then, however I like to catch up on my ZZZZs on the weekend and sleep in. It didn’t help that I tossed and turned all night long for some reason.…