Monday, February 4, 2013

Week Ending Feb 2nd

by Craig

I get to write this week's review, not because I may have had the most miles of any of us, but likely because I ran all 7 days this past week and was along for just about everyone's individual adventures, minus one or two.

It was a decent week for everyone, I think. The weather finally took a turn for the better following a storm the weekend prior. I was coming off a tiring four days at the Winter Outdoor Retailer Trade Show and was looking forward to getting back into a good training rhythm. On Sunday, Scott and I hoped the trail up to Lake Mountain would be tracked out. Surprisingly, it wasn't bad and we had a nice, if not slow, trudge up to the summit.If you haven't been up Lake Mountain, I would highly suggest it as it offers some of the best views around.

Running along the ridge.

Tuesday the Wasatch Mountain Wranglers - in this case me, Matt W, Scott, and Jennilyn - tried our hand at the Avenue Twins. We knew it would be a slog with all the new snow, but we didn't care. The trail was surprisingly good as we ran in a full snowstorm up the BST. Then we hit the ridge to the Twins and were now breaking trail. We did hit both peaks though, no wussing out this time. On the way back I did a full-on face plant right in front of four uphill skiers. That was a good time. It was a scary drive back to the office, but a fun day of running overall.

Yes, it was as bad as it looks in this pic

Ugh, Thursday. What a mess that day was. While MVH was smart enough to run on the roads and Matt W with his work crew on the BST, Scott and I thought we'd try out hand at Wire Peak. That was a horrible idea. Once off the BST the trail disappeared and we post-holed all the way to the summit. At times it was up to our thighs. I even took to crawling at one point because it was the only way I could move across the snow without punching through. As horrible and miserable as it was we always walk away with a smile and look back now and laugh.

Crawling to the towers. It finally got runnable 20 ft later.


Friday, while the other boys were sleeping, working, or smoking weed (ok, none of them smokes weed) I ran the Gully all the way up to Lower Bell Canyon Reservoir. I was in shorts and a long sleeve shirt. How awesome is that. Scott and Brent did join me for the first bunch of miles, but I finished out the rest alone. They had to get back to work a little sooner than me, otherwise they would have been with me the whole time. Perfect day.


Finally, on Saturday, the whole Wasatch Mountain Wranglers crew made a mad dash up Mt Olympus. We had to break trail from before the saddle. There was a whole dang bunch of antics going on, many of which can't even be explained. Much of it was caught on video though and here is a preview. The full length version will be posted in the next day or two. No one tell my wife I did a flip out of a tree. And I know some of her nurse friends read this blog. I'm not a smart man.


Here's to another great week of playing in the beautiful Wasatch Front. It's only Monday and I can already tell you that the boys have been going off! Fun week ahead.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

the question is does your wife read this blog herself??? do you guys just have your regular trail shoes on for the snow slogging or yak traks or??? I had to pave a trail just on the parleys trail from foot hill to wasatch drive and it took me FOREVER!

jun said...

Lisa, no, my wife doesn't read my blog, even though I often tell her to. Not sure she even knows the address.
We all own Kahtoola Microspikes. We wear them depending on the conditions. If it's hard pack trail not usually. If it is in any way icy, then yes. Most of us wear Altra Lone Peaks which have the best traction ever. Generally, even without spikes we don't have a problem slipping.