Fun at Pinelands

After a few good looks at the Pineland Farms Trail Challenge map last night, we decided to start at the "start" and head out onto the course together. Snowman was planning to run about 6 miles with me, and then I would continue on alone. I had told him last week that I thought the beginning of the race course was much rougher than the Oak Hill section we ran together last week. Nothing is flat. It's lots of ups and downs, over and over. The fields and the trails through the woods were more rutted and uneven, and today after all the rain we were wet and muddy almost immediately. Oh well. It's all part of the trail running game :-) Still, I wasn't sure he believed me that it would be that much rougher, until we were both struggling after a few miles... I have to admit I'm glad I'm only signed up for the 25k. I think doing two laps of this course is going to be really tough! More power to you, Nate!

Anyway, we powered on, and when we got to the yurt, I expected Snowman to turn around, but he decided to continue on with me. I was happy to have him join me, as it meant I didn't have to interpret the map :-) and I had someone to run with for longer too!

When we got back to the car, Snowman stopped, having gone much farther than expected (about 9.5 miles). Yeah Snowman! We were both pretty spent, and I have to admit that those 9.5 miles were much harder than I expected. I was really tempted to stop, and almost did, but pulled things back together after about 30 seconds, and continued on across the street. I did the inner Oak Hill loop, adding 2.5 miles onto the run, finishing in 1:57. OK, so I didn't get in 14 miles, but the 12 I did get in were more than enough!

To all you other crazies who have signed up for this race, definitely be prepared for a challenge!

Flora and fauna notes: Despite the huffing and puffing that I was doing along the trail, I was really happy to see lots of blooming trout lilies and a few red wake robin trillium too. I am not sure Snowman really appreciated the trillium, as he gave me a very rude gesture when I pointed them out to him as we were running up one particularly stiff hill!