Saturday Katie and I took off to meet my parents at Massanutten to do a little skiing where my dad is part of their volunteer ski patrol. The temperature started off cold so the mountain was a bit icy but as the day warmed up...as it always does in Virginia, the icy stuff got pretty soft, and made for some decent conditions. Katie and I took a picture at the top of the mountain and realized we had a picture like that when we were young before we were dating.
This is us now.
This was us then. I've known her for a long time.
Sunday I went out to the VHTRC's Massanutten Mountain Trails 100 training run. 85 people started! I love that so many people come out and run in the mountains just for fun. I got there with about 30 seconds to spare so as the group left the parking lot, I was still putting on my pack. I ran with a mountain-biker named Kyle, AJW and a girl named Emily. AJW is an incredibly accomplished ultrarunner completing Western States in the top ten 7 times. But, as he is returning from a knee injury, we continued up the first climb without him. When we got to the top Emily told us about how she is also training for Western States and after asking her about her qualifier, turns out she came in 2nd at the JFK 50 last year. She too, was under the old course record. Yikes.
This "fun run" attracted two pretty big named people. It was a bit intimidating but they were both very nice and Emily and I ended up running the whole thing together because neither of us were 100% sure on where to go at certain spots and Kyle bolted off as soon as we got to the top of Kearns mountain because he runs up there all the time and said he knew the trail really well. We didn't see him the rest of the day.
The view off of Bird Knob
Emily and I meandered through the woods the rest of the day and ended back at the same parking lot we started in just as they were lighting the fire. Everyone who had cut the run a bit short was hanging out, there was food, beverage, fire and dogs. Good times.
Crocs are a thing....
Monday I met up with my friend Scott and his dog, Henry, at the Buck Hollow trail to get some miles in on MLK Day. I had never done that trail before, but it turned out to be a great day as well.
The highest little bump of rocks up there is Mary's Rock. My mom and dad used to take us up there for hikes. My dad would pack this giant red backpack full of food and a camp stove and cook us eggs and bacon up there.
Scott and Henry leading the way.
When we got back to the car, after 17 or 18 miles Henry promptly fell asleep on the ground. Scott had to wake him up and coax him into the car with treats.
All in all, solid weekend.
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