Starting to Push that Envelope Back up the Hill (Mountain Madness 25K and Palisades 6 hour run)
I've now been "back at it" for eight weeks I believe, but the last two weekends were important milestones on the way back to ultra health from the stress fracture that kept me off the trails for two months this summer. Last weekend it was my first race since Bighorn in June, "MoMa" in the 25K edition, and then yesterday I did my longest training run, at a little over 6 hours and about 23.6 miles at the Palisades. MoMa It was fun doing this event again, with pals Garth, Lesley and Jeff, and with Mat who drove out with us but did the 50K which started an hour earlier. It's one of my favorite race courses in the area, as it's rugged, mountainous (yes, northern NJ actually has some low mountains, these being the Ramapos and it's not far from where the A.T. goes through the NJ/NY border area), almost all single or double track, and a real test of your trail and navigational (i.e., ribbon- and blaze-following) skills. On the latter, I "fell dow