Hit The Trails

Things are finally starting to warm up. The weather, for the most part has been pretty good and continues to improve. I had some good opportunities this past week to get out climbing and I am finally recovering from my cold so I was also able to get out and run some trails, also.
Tuesday and Thursday I got out with Steve and did some bouldering in LCC. We went to the Secret Garden and warmed up really quick and then headed up to the Tiger Stripe boulder. There were several more people who were all very strong up there and it was cool to watch them project some of the very hard problems. Steve and I both decided to try Lance's Scary problem. It is a V7 that starts well off the ground and traverses up and right, finishing on Shingles. It took me a few tries, but I found a hidden good hold and grovelled my way through the rest of it. Steve did it second try and made it look easy. Kyle followed us and also made it look easy.
On Thursday Steve and I went back up during lunch and climbed at the parking lot boulders. The weather was starting to turn nasty, but we stuck around until we were getting fully dumped on. We found a new, very tough V5 on the parking lot boulder that we'll have to go back for. It is really cool. Below is a picture of me on it.

 

I shot several good photos of Steve on a boulder higher up. This problem is ultra classic, even at the V2 rating. It never gets climbed, yet it has perfect holds, is kind of tall, and can be a bit scary if you aren't a confident climber. You can see the obvious enjoyment on Steve's face.

 

 

On Saturday I met up with Scott and Matt to run the Bonneville shoreline trail for Matt's Birthday Challenge. I met Scott at the parking lot east of the capital building at 6am. We only had to wait 5 minutes or so before Matt came running up. He had started from his house across the mountain much earlier and had already run 8.8 miles just to meet us. He turned 33 a couple of days ago and was shooting to run 33 miles total. Scott and I were going to run at least 15 of it with him.

We ran up the road a little over a mile until we got to the trail for the Bonneville Shorline Trail in City Creek Canyon. It was immediatly a mix of broken snow and slush that had frozen over during the night. The trail would remain in that state for the entirety of our run. It made going very difficult, but still managable. We ran the BST all the way out the Dry Creek Trailhead, 7.5 miles. It in an incredibly hilly course with few rests and almost no flat sections, it's either up or down the whole way, just how I like it.
When we hit the half way point Matt and I had opened a considerable lead on Scott. Not surprising considering he hiked Olympus yesterday. I'm sure he was feeling it this morning. We ate some snacks and waited for about 5 minutes before heading back up the trail hoping to meet up with him as he was coming down. What actually happened was that he had  turned back a mile earlier, knowing he was short on time and headed back the way we had came. I got ahead of Matt, which made sense becuase I was only 10 miles in and he was almost 20. With about three miles left I caught up to Scott. I caught him on a 2 mile mostly downhill section that I was just flying down. I felt good today. I then pulled ahead of him and beat both he and Matt back to the cars by about 5 minutes. I was hoping to continue on and run the last 8.8 with Matt back to his house, but I called my wife and she asked if I could come home. I chose the better path. It was an amazing morning with perfect weather, a beautiful course, and good friends. Sorry, no photos, but hopefully I painted a mental picture good enough that you don't need one. Can't wait to get out this coming week.