12 Mile Run on North Shore
James and I ran North Shore trail yesterday. I had actually never done this trail, not even on the bike. It turned out great. Initially the weather was looking a bit tougher, like freezing rain or sleet, but it was beautiful! Sunny, about 34 degrees (felt warmer due to the nice sun), great day. We got a bit messed up trying to find the trailhead from where we parked, detouring maybe a mile along the water before doing this crazy climb up through the blackberry bushes to get back to the road, then down the road to finally find the trailhead.
We'd originally planned to do 10 miles, but got to the parking lot at the other end (roughly 5 mile point), and were both feeling good, so decided to go a bit longer to see what was beyond. Finally, at 55 minutes in (and we think right about 6 miles), we turned around, mostly out of time constraint. While this wound up being 5 miles longer than any run I'd done this year, it felt great, but was likely good we turned when we did.
The trail was in great shape, and was a good one. It's a lot of little up and down, various quick stream crossings, slightly rocky in some spots. But, we ran a good pace, in the low 9 minute miles, which is good for both of us at that distance. We normally run slightly hillier stuff, so it maybe was not too fast, but still felt great.
It seemed to warm up nicely too, although I think was still in the mid-30's when we got back. James actually ran the whole day in just a t-shirt, compared to me in a thin Pearli long sleeve base, and an Icebreaker GT180 top (I shed my jacket pretty quickly). I wasn't sure but used my Mountain Hardware Momentum gloves, and that wound up being perfect. I really love these gloves, they can handle quite a temperature range, and they breathe SO well! Was also wearing Pearli knickers, and Inov-8 X-Talon 212 shoes (as usual these days).
Finally, at about 8 or 9 mile mark, had a gel (Hammer banana), and that was a very smart choice. I could tell just a short while later as it kicked in. I finished quite strong, and James was bummin' he hadn't brought a gel (and that was the only one I had). All in all, a really great day of running. Total time was 1hr 52 mins, over 12 miles. With such a big jump in mileage, I'm very excited that I'll be able to ramp up my mileage in time for the Peterson Ridge Rumble 20 miler in early April.
