Man, I would need to write a chapter in a book to completely cover the details of yesterday’s run, but here is the abridged version. We planned a nice long trail run today and selected the Snow Hill Trailhead of the Little-Big Econ State Forrest. This wildlife management area is part of a wildlife corridor of approximately 8,000 acres. River floodplain forests and oak hammocks are home to gray fox, river otter, wild turkey, bobcat, resident and migratory waterfowl, wood storks, wading birds, shorebirds, and numerous upland species including white-tailed deer and turkey. Other common sightings include sandhill cranes, alligators, bald eagles, osprey, and hawks.
So the trail run was fun, a first for me. The trail was thick with roots and brush, as well as the occasional downed tree to hop over. The footbridges (seen at the bottom) were quite interesting. About 25 minutes into the run we decided to take a 2.1 mile trail to Rt. 426 figuring we could run the streets back. At about the 45 minute mark, with the trail at its thickest, and the sun rapidly sinking in the sky we became mildly concerned thinking, we may be running back in the dark. Luckily we were spit out into a large clearing which led to 426. I was feeling pretty good until I realized where we were. We were about 8 miles from our car! We began heading back on a two-lane highway with no shoulder in the dark. Fun, Fun. We all felt pretty good and ran a solid 7:30 – 8:00 minutes pace. At the 1:33 mark, Christian and I peeled off to a gas station. While we enjoyed several cups of Gatorade, Ian ran another 2.5 miles, making it to the car in 2 hours and 1 minute. Each of us took a nice digger on the run, with mine being a 4-second long doozy on a darkened sidewalk (yielding a nice scrape or two). All in all it was a great run, and I earned a day off today. By the way, I have been slammed and not blogged my last three runs which were 40, 36, and 18 minutes in length.
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