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Another Kings Peak Double – 52 miles

Kings Peak is the highest peak in Utah. I again attempted to do a Kings Peak Triple (three consecutive summits from the trailhead, 78 miles), but again I came up short.  I think this is one of the mentally toughest running accomplishments that I have attempted.   I just couldn’t push myself to go out again for that long third trip.  But wow!  I had an incredible adventure.

This time, I started earlier so both summits #1 and #2 would be accomplished in the daylight.  Then, I could take my sweet time on summit #3 during the night.  It was a good plan  and I stayed right to my schedule.

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Kings Peak Double – 53 miles

Kings Peak is the highest peak in Utah at 13,528 feet.  I’ve summited it ten times in the past.   In 2010 I accomplished the first double Kings Peak, trailhead to summit and back, and then did it again.  I knew a triple Kings Peak was within my reach so I went to give it a try.

I arrived at the Henry Fork trailhead early Friday morning and snoozed until dawn and then got ready.  About ten minutes before heading out, I noticed two young guys, probably in their 20s heading out with light day packs running.  Good, I would have someone to try to catch.   I wasn’t going to try to push the pace hard because I needed to save it for the other trips, but I felt really well running at 10,000 feet with all the running I have been doing recently at altitude.  As I ran early, I was puzzled that I had not yet caught the two guys, but I finally did at the four-mile mark.  This time I decided to be open with people I met and tell them that I was doing the run multiple times.  It would be entertaining all day hearing the reactions.   I reached Elk Horn crossing (mile 5.5) at 1:08.

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Grand Mesa 100

This was the first time I had run Grand Mesa 100, a relatively new race.  I arrived Friday afternoon and was impressed with Grand Mesa, a high plateau above 10,000 feet.   I decided to camp near the start because of the early start time the next morning, 5:00 a.m.   I greeted friends at the pre-race meeting and enjoyed a relaxing evening by Island Lake.

I managed to get a good night’s rest and it was nice to have only a five-minute drive to the start.  We were away at 5 a.m.  The course layout is very confusing and I hoped that I studied it enough to not take too many wrong turns.   The first giant 11-mile loop was very nice.  We climbed above 11,000 feet onto a narrow ridge that gave great views except for the hazy smoke down in the valleys.  I finished the loop 15 minutes slower than I hoped, but I was still doing fine.  There were only 29 100-mile runners and a bunch of 50-mile and 60K runners.  I was running in the top 10.

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Happy Jack 24-hour run

Mike Place was the last runner accepted into Hard Rock 100 from the wait list just the day before the race.   I had agreed to pace him for the last half of the race if he got in, so I quickly got ready and headed for Colorado.  I arrived that night and with only a couple hours of sleep arrived in time to watch the start.   I saw Mike at the 10-mile aid station and he didn’t look well.  I commented to Matt Watts after he left, that I doubted he would make it to my pickup point.  During the rest of the morning I tried to get some rest and it wasn’t until about 2 p.m. that I noticed in the results that Mike had dropped at 15 miles.  It turned out to be scary, but he was OK.  I decided to drive to Laramie in time to make the start for the Happy Jack 24-hour run.

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Duck Mountain Loop Run – Uintas

The High Uintas are open early this year for running.   It was time to get up there.  I was interested in trying something new and decided to go run the Brown Duck Mountain Loop.   The trailhead is north of Duchesne and Mountain Home, at Moon Lake.  It was an easy drive, 2:45 from my home, all on pavement.   I arrived about 11 p.m. and slept in the car.   I woke up at 4 a.m. to get ready, but there was a big windstorm going through with a little rain.  I had no desire to run in terrible wind, so I went back to sleep.

I ended up getting on the trail around 7 a.m. and had wonderful weather all day.  The rain the previous day or night was nice because the trail was soft and not very dusty.  I had previously thought about also summitting Duck Mountain, but as I approached it, I could see that it was just a pile of rocks.  To get to the summit and back to the trail would be six miles of boulder hopping which would take hours.  Instead, I tried to run the actual loop fairly fast, faster than my normal adventure runs.   But I took plenty of time for pictures and several stops to eat.    The video tells the rest of the story.

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Climb up Cascade Mountain

During the terrible heat wave this weekend, I tried to escape the heat by climbing high, above 10,000 feet.  I climbed Cascade Mountain for the first time which towers above Provo/Orem, the next mountain to the south of Mount Timpanogos.   It was 81 degrees when I started in the dark and 103 when I returned to my car.   My Garmin said I climbed more than 11,000 feet.   Here’s a video of the adventure:

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Solo Kat’cina Mosa 100K run

Probably the toughest 100K race in the country is held in Utah, in August each year. It is called Kat’cina Mosa 100K but its name has nothing to do with the geography. The race director has interests in the Hopi culture from Arizona, so he named the course after it. A more apt name would probably be Wasatch Back 100K. The course runs a huge loop behind the Wasatch Mountains that rise above Provo and Springvale. Nearly half of the course shares the same course as Squaw Peak 50, but in the opposite direction. Kat’cina Mosa runs clockwise and includes about 17,000 feet of climbing along the way over its 62 miles.

For the past ten weeks, I have been doing very long weekend runs instead of daily workouts. I have accomplished eight runs of 50 miles or more during those ten weeks. By doing so many very long runs in close succession, my body is adapting and recovering very fast, getting ready for the next run. This weekend, I chose to run the Kat’cina Mosa course solo and unsupported, through the night.

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Bighorn 100

This was my 7th finish at Bighorn.  I was amazed how more competitive the field is now compared to my first time there in 2006.   I started slow, felt really slow, but I was just about 5 minutes slower on the first huge climb compared to my best year in 2010.

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Aging and shifting focus

As I near age 55, thoughts about how aging affects my ultrarunning are frequent.  Because I started running at age 46, I never knew what youthful speed I might have possessed.  I consider my running antics a constant experiment for one who is aging and hope to inspire other of similar agedness to be active and experience life on the trails.  At age 46, I started slowly, barely finishing races, but with each year saw improvement and wondered when I would reach my speed peak before age became the main limiting factor.

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Squaw Peak 50 adventure run

After running Bryce 100 last week, I took a rest for a few days and the decided that I should to do something crazy.  I went and ran the Squaw Peak 50 course unsupported because I missed it last week since it was on the same weekend as Bryce 100 this year.

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Bryce 100

Bryce 100 is a new 100-mile race held on the next major ridge line to the west of Bryce Canyon National Park.  While the race is not held in the national park, along the way runners are able to view many similar rock formations and run a few miles through hoodoos. It runs above and below what are called the Sunset Cliffs that face to the west. Much of the course is above 9,000 feet, so altitude is a major factor both because of lower oxygen and cooler weather.  The course is deceptively tough but the beauty is first-class.

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Paria Canyon Run 50-miles

I went to do one of my favorite run, Paria Canyon located halfway between Kanab and Page on the Utah/Arizona border.  It is the scene of my first major backpack trip back in the mid 90s that hooked me on the outdoors.   I came away from that with swollen ankles and could hardly walk for a week.   I returned years later for my first long-distance “run” and also came away injured.  This would be my sixth time in the canyon.  End-to-end to Lees Ferry is around 42-45 miles depending on routes.   This video tells much of the story:

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