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I met up at the Arboretum this morning with @KimJ and @jennarice for my first challenge effort (but Kim’s second - way to get started early!!).
I’ve set a goal to #RunEveryStreet in the City of Ithaca by Memorial Day, so yesterday I had been ticking off the side streets that go north & south from East Buffalo on the hillside. My legs were feeling pretty trashed from all the vert in that run, so I was not too happy to see the stairs up the hillside a couple hundred meters in.
@KimJ made the executive decision that we would power-walk the stairs - not too bad - but after we crossed the stone bridge over Beebe, we saw the three flights of stairs leading up to the Observatory. Power walk again! I guess this is a trail run after all.
Heading north toward Jessup, it started getting pretty hot and sunny. We were glad to duck into Palmer Woods and be under a little tree cover, then we headed out into Cayuga Heights. Fortunately, the course goes over the more rolling hills of the Heights, not the really steep ones, but less fortunately, it never really seems to go downhill…
We ran past frat houses for a mile or so, then across the suspension bridge - not my favorite - and up another flight of stairs as @KimJ wondered what Adam could possibly have been thinking (“I need you all ready for cross-country!” was the only part I’m at liberty to repeat). From the bridge, we headed straight past my office on Central Ave, then past about a thousand undergrads taking pictures with all the pink blossoms in the sunshine. Maybe it’s a grad photo, maybe they’re influencers, who knows.
No more stairs on campus - instead you get a little breather over the flat Arts Quad, then our quads got engaged as we went up Tower Road toward the greenhouses. @jennarice pointed out her grains to us, then we were very, very happy to see Arboretum Rd and its nice, shallow, actually paved downhill toward the parking lot.
This course may only be 5.2 miles with 450ish feet of vert, but we all agreed at the end that it felt more like 7-8. Was it the heat? Was it all the Buffalo Street hills on my legs from the day before? Only another trip will tell…
Hah! As @KimJ remembers from yesterday, @tonya-engst gets the credit/blame for this course. But “I need you all ready for cross-country” is undoubtedly what she’s thinking too.
In fact, we tried to break up the stairs, but it didn’t work out. For the stairs up from the Beebe Lake bridge, there’s actually a tiny trail that goes up to a waterfall and then hits the stairs again halfway up. The Cornell Botanic Gardens people asked us not to send runners there.
And then we thought about turning right after the suspension bridge to avoid the stairs up to the Johnson Art Museum, but that forces crossing University Ave in a much more dangerous area, and you still have to run up a steep hill to get to the top of Libe Slope. So we decided the stairs were the lesser of the weevils.
Everyone will have quads of steel by the end of the Challenge.
A necessary comparison will be running it backwards. 
A bonus of having my office directly on this course is I have easy access! (The creator of this course, @tonya-engst, works in the same building as me. Coincidence…?)
This is a pleasant loop when it isn’t the temperature of the sun out, and it began sprinkling as I was finishing up.
I woke up bright and early to run this for the first time starting in the dark. The RunGo directions worked pretty well except for one confusing spot entering the wildflower garden right near the beginning. Turns out the first half mile is the same as last year’s Beebe Lake course. The off-road bit through Palmer Woods is a nice break from running on asphalt. I passed a woodpecker banging away on a stop sign as I neared the finish in the arboretum.
A very nice thing about my office building (besides that @heathercobb3 has an office down the hall :-)) is that it is almost adjacent to Barton Hall (indoor track) and Teagle Hall (weight room), so it is perfect for certain types of runners, such as myself. My favorite way to get from Libe Slope to the farm road into the Botanic Gardens has more trail, but when I planned this route, I was thinking that Tower Road is difficult to get lost on—and it goes by the Dairy Bar, which has not only ice cream but also a bathroom.
Speaking of bathrooms, I ran the Challenge course today with @amandaking and we spotted an available portapotty in the parking lot next to where the course enters the Wildflower Garden (this is about one-quarter mile from the start of the course). It looked like it had been set out for hikers and runners to use.
I was excited to see another course that I can run right from my office, literally from the front of my building. The only catch (that I learned today) is that the RunGo directions will pick me up and direct me on the run UNTIL I reach the true starting point. I tried messing with the app while running but quickly gave up. When I tried to check if I was on course when leaving the sidewalk to follow the trail near Palmer Woods, I almost got hit by a bike. As per my usual MO, I got lost in Cayuga Heights, this time on foot. Do NOT look down while running across the suspension bridge, it is terrifying!!
I was off course by less than 0.1 miles, so covered the ground by adding some distance on Tower Road. I’ll have to give this course another go to complete it as intended.
Or, rather, they see it as the finishing point. 
I think if you had restarted them when you got to the FLRC Challenge sign, they would have been fine again.
Yes, the finishing point! It certainly did not ‘feel’ like the finishing point to me. I did try to restart them, but I’m technologically inept and didn’t want to take the time to figure it out. I do struggle with the RunGo app, it just isn’t intuitive to me. Next time I am planning just to start the directions at the start! What a novel concept.
Yeah, RunGo takes a little getting used to. I recommend playing with it a bit before relying on it for a completely unknown course so you have a better idea of how it works.
I always use it on my Apple Watch. The trick there is to load the route in the RunGo iPhone app at home and then tap the button that transfers it to the watch before leaving. Make sure it’s on the watch and available to start while you still have connectivity. That way you can start without fuss when you’re at the course.
After the group run at Cass this morning, I headed over to the Botanic Gardens for a loop here. It was rainy, but pleasant while running.
@amandaking and I ran amidst rain and sun and flowers. An abundance of flowers. I need to do this course more slowly so I can take photos of all the lovely flowers.
I agree with @tonya-engst, even in the rain the Cornell campus is stunning in the springtime. Jamie and I did stop to smell the lilacs just starting to bloom by the parking lot before the outdoor track. Spectcular! I also recommend remarking on the landscaping of some of the houses on Iroquois as you run down. Sorry, no photo of that.
@Challengers Just a word of warning to you all - as I ran the course this morning, the ground crews were starting to put up fencing for Slope Day, which will impact the path along the top of the Slope. It was still passable this morning, but this may change in the next couple of days.
Slope Day itself is on Wednesday 10 May, so I’d definitely recommend avoiding the Cornell Scenic Circuit course on that day…
Happy running!
Another heads up: the band Dead and Company will perform at Barton Hall on the evening of Monday, May 8th. I imagine that campus will be crazy then. As staff, I have received alerts from Transportation Services about road and parking lot closures.
