Story
Following a quick Duck Trails session I made it up to the Hammond parking lot without much time left to finish the Tough Trail Challenge within 12 hours elapsed. (You can read my July 4th Duck Trails post for the explanation.) By the time I scanned the Hoctothon sign I had to finish in no more than 1 hour 33 minutes to make the 4:01 p.m. deadline. I knew this would be a stretch in the heat, with 20 miles on my legs already since 4:01 a.m. I honestly didn’t know if I’d make it, but figured I’d at least record the completion to hopefully win the HHH sign for logging the most runs.
Higher up in the hills and under tree cover the heat wasn’t too bad. Both lower appendages were cooked though. I quickly found myself hiking the uphills and making up lost time on the downs. One of the funnest local trail sections to run is the gate-to-gate segment from Hammond Hill Road down B1 and the snowmobile trail to Canaan Road.
The Y8 climb always wears on me, and on the hike up I was continuously checking my watch to make sure I was ahead of 10-minute pace. After the turn onto Y5 the course is pretty easy the rest of the way (except for the technical B3 loop). I’d just have to limit the walking and I’d make it.
Thankfully RunGo had no issues today, so no need to think about any of the turns. I walked some on B3 because I was paranoid that I’d faceplant on a root and derail the day’s effort. Perhaps it was PTSD from when I wiped out on B3 two days earlier and tore up my lower leg.
It wasn’t until two miles to go and 23 minutes to do it that I truly knew the TTC completion was in the bag. When I scanned the finish sign it was 11 hours 55 minutes elapsed, with a sub-5-hour cumulative run time. I was sure glad to only be running 5 courses today instead of all 10. Now I gotta find a day for the Tough Tarmac.
I forgot to take a finish line pic so here’s one with Joel after I got home.
