Taughannock Rim & Falls Star Posts

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This was a Loehr classic “while we are at it” situation. Jamie and I headed out to Taughannock this morning to do the 24 mile bike as training for his intermediate distance Cayuga Lake Triathlon this summer. Half way there we realized we ought to run the Taughannock challenge course afterwards, “while we were at it”, since we would be right there. Luckily we each had running shoes in addition to our biking shoes, though no bike locks. Since the park was literally like Grand Central Station (see photo) this glorious spring morning, Jamie felt it was safe to leave the unlocked bikes on the back of the car. Lucky for us they were still there when we returned.

My legs are still surprising sore from our Lick Brook/Treman escapade (my quads are actually
painful to touch) and definitely felt like jelly for the first half mile of the run, after getting off our bikes, yet slowly but surely we persevered. It truly is the ideal spring day!

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On our way back home we stopped at Greenstar for a “Happy Birthday” smoothly treat for Jamie. He also discovered a vegan chocolate oreo cake “while we were there” which means I’m off the hook for baking a cake this afternoon (maybe I’ll take a nap instead :crazy_face:). We did consider running the Inlet Trail course “while we were there”, but quickly thought better of it!

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Today is my 60th birthday and now I am running races for the 60+ crew. My goal was to finish every course once before my birthday to get credit at age 59 (success two days ago, finishing with the Lick Brook Treman monster run) and now I want to run them all again as a sixty year old. Today was the start of that plan and tomorrow we’ll run Lansing with the group. Just FYI - Liz Hartman is doing the same thing as she turns 40 in June.

I also have a goal to do the intermediate length triathlon at Taughannock with the Cayuga Lake Triathlon race. I have run the sprint distance for about ten years so this is going to be my stretch for a year. So Caitlin and I started the day biking 24 mile course out from Taughannock, past Lucas Winery, and then down to Sheldrake Point and back. Doing the Taughannock Rim trail run gave me confidence that I can do the 10K part of the triathlon after the bike ride. Now I just need to get my training in for the swim!

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We picked up some treats at GreenStar after our bike/run, including a birthday cake. See Caitlin’s post for the picture.

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Story

All’s well that ends well. I might have had a little too much wine and laughter last night but still got up early enough for an intense sweaty GRIT class at FLX Fitclub this morning, then grabbed a coffee at Gimme!, and made my way to the upper parking lot of Taughannock Falls, where the North Rim Trail and South Rim Trail meet. I walked around and around that area but couldn’t find the start sign. :thinking: :upside_down_face: I checked my Run Go Directions, which I thought made it look like I was in the right spot to start - but where was the FLRC Challenge Sign??? Armed with my Run Go (which didn’t tell me I was in the wrong spot and that I was wrongly under the impression that the course started here), I took off with a gentle jog to make my way down the South Rim Trail. All went well. The day was heating up with sunshine but there is plenty of shade on these trails. It was especially nice and cool running up and back along the gorge trail. Then I had come back to Rt 89 and hit the stairs to begin my way up the North Rim Trail. Whew! I really my previous night’s shenanigans and GRIT class there, but slowly and steadily ascended the stairs and hill. Much to my surprise, as I approached the Welcome Center by the falls overlook, my Run Go directions were telling me that I had arrived! Indeed, I had arrived and there was the elusive FLRC Challenge Sign!!! I took a photo of the falls and check trail directions on Run Go again - this time seeing that I was now at the actual start location. Whoops!/LOL. So started jogging again to continue up the North Rim Trail to where I had started and counted my time there. Overall, I completed the course and its mileage, just not the way it was meant to be so I’ll probably be re-doing it at some point. :smiling_face:

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After the Taughannock Rim trail, I went to the Falls Tavern in Trumansburg where I had Today’s Special: BBQ’d Beef Brisket over Mac & Cheese. The brisket was tender and delicious and the mac and cheese was the real deal - just like my mom used to make, with plenty of sharp cheddar cheese in the sauce. Yum! I also drank A LOT of iced tea to get refreshed. :grinning:

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@Gretchen it’s all about “covering the ground” - as long as you get all aspects of the course covered, you do not need to start and stop at the sign. I personally would rather do this course starting at the bottom with the gorge trail, up the north rim and finish with a fun downhill on the south rim.

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When I was training for Cayuga Trails 50 years ago, I did crazy stuff like this run multiple times. Once, 4x! Today, 2x was in the cards. I started by doing up/down/up, then switched it around to down/up/down for a nice downhill finish. Happy to keep the splits between the halves pretty even, within a minute of each other. The heat of the day was already present at 10a so I was happy to finish when I did! Got to say hello to @gmallinger as I started: he was finishing his effort for the day.

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The day’s schedule called for other pursuits before shopping local, but after polishing off the lawn (with my reel mower, to add more insult to my screaming calves) and helping with a cake delivery, I got to hit up Viva Tacqueria with Amy and friends. All in all, a great day!

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Story

This morning I headed out to the Challenge Course that is closest to my house. Sundays are typically my longer run days, so I decided I would run the course then continue in the area for more mileage. I started at the the trailhead of the Gorge Trail, ran the Gorge Trail, headed up the South Rim, and down the North Rim. After completing the course, I ran the Gorge Trail again then crossed 89 to run around the edge of the lake in the park for 8 miles total.

Several thoughts ran through my head: 1) STAY ON THE TRAIL!! I’m talking about other people I saw while I was out running. This really bugs me for safety reasons and also for preservation of the natural area. 2) Was I on the course trail or the ‘tourist’ trail?! You know those short loops that take you to a scenic vantage point! 3) I think we Challengers need to come up with a secret wave or something to identify fellow Challengers on the course. 4) I need to run a lot more trails!

No local shopping for me today though yesterday I took my kids for haircuts at a local salon, picked up a few perishable items from Shur Save, made two stops (Napa and Stover Lumber) looking for bolts for my husband, and finally picked up some treats at Gimme Coffee where I tried the Coconut Lime Bread. Yum! It seems like this should count, but it wasn’t on the same day as my run. Maybe I should have ran the track yesterday! :thinking:

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A post was split to a new topic: Ways of identifying fellow Challengers?

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I signed Ben (my partner) up for the Twilight 5k race and now he needs to train :rofl: so today I dragged him to Taughannock to run the (much harder) challenge course. For someone who does not run frequently he did a great job! Today was another perfect day for a run and those stunning views of the falls and the lake totally make it up for the tough uphill parts.





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Lots of shopping today! We stopped at Purity for burgers and fries, and at the Finger Lakes Running store for some new running gear. Both Ben and I got new shoes. I’ve been running the trails with my Nike Zoom Vaporfly which is a bit ridiculous. I do more road running but I wanted a better pair of shoes that could work for some light trail running as well so I got a new pair of Brooks Ghost. I also got some gels because tomorrow I want to tackle the dreaded Lick Brook & Treman FLT course so I figured I needed some nutrition. We’ll see how it goes! :crossed_fingers:

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FYI Challengers!

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And … the base/gorge trail is open again! It took them part of today to finish cleaning it up, but now it’s all ready for a weekend of fun. @amy-dawson and I hit this after work today, a fine way to kick off the weekend. Kind of nice to have the trails mostly empty after the busy-ness of Cornell grad and Memorial Day crowds!

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We shopped local, but not what you think. After a quick clean-up, we headed to Groton for a cake delivery. Why not stop somewhere on the way home? It was the wrong time of day when we did the group run at Lansing, but today it was the RIGHT time of day for Salt Point Brewing. We had a delicious duo of Lansing Fog NEIPAs, paired with a simple margherita pizza and caesar salad.

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Story

After 3 days of the trail being closed, and me being too busy to actually run during those 3 days, my legs weren’t too exhausted. Despite telling Scott I was going to run this slow because I was tired (which I was), from the first step my goal was a PR. I have been motivating my students via athletic stories lately and the story I spun for myself while running was that I had the best run ever and it was blazing fast. I refused to look at my watch and just ran by feel. 3/4 of the way through, I encountered police wandering the area and kind of freaked out a bit. I said, “that doesn’t look good” as I ran by them. I attempted to run fast on the downhills (I’m petrified of downhills) and I tried to run most of the time (I succeeded in this - just walked all stairs). It was good. I got the PR but didn’t beat @teressa.naylor. We have been motivating each other to try harder lately - it’s a fun little push to have some friendly competition in my life and it’s making us both stronger. A super fun run to end the week.

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After the run, I had to deliver a wedding cake to Groton. @scottpdawson drove while I babysat the cake in the backseat. Our reward for running and delivering the cake safely was to check out Salt Point Brewing. We joked that if the Lansing Center Trail wasn’t so muddy we’d log a stroll on it for some miles, but instead we just enjoyed a beer and some pizza and salad before heading home by way of scenic lake road choices.

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Story

Took Dior in the trailer (she actually ran most of the way out and back, riding only when there were other dogs or bikers!) and biked out to Taughannock via the BDT. We parked at the overlook and ran the challenge course. It was a beautiful day to be outside, glorious, sunny, breezy. The park was quiet as it was fairly early. Boy that last uphill is a butt kicker!

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And when I saw your photo before reading, I was thinking, “She biked the Taughannock course? Holy cow!” But biking to the course and then running, all with your dog, who could apparently hitch rides whenever she wanted—now that’s a great story.

Story

Taughannock was a giant puddle this morning after all the rain last night. I parked at the lower lot, figured I’d do the Gorge Trail first as a flat/easy warmup, then up and around clockwise. I was still pretty sore from Tuesday, so I decided after 1/4 mile to call this a recovery run. Pretty uneventful on the South Rim Trail. I saw a pair of Challengers around mile 4 at the upper lot getting ready to start, but I was in the middle of throwing down a 6:58 final mile, so I couldn’t stop to chat. So much for recovery run!

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Fresh ingredients for a turkey BLT (or 2)

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Story

I headed out to this course on Friday afternoon to start the weekend. Though I’ve been in Ithaca for a year now, I had never been to the upper/rim part of the park and only been to the lower trail during the PGXC Taughannock race.

Despite the beautiful clear weather, surprisingly few people were there! I saw one couple on the way in who had just come from Buffalo for Gorges (good luck!!) and then maybe only 5 other groups, even on the flatter trail at the bottom of the gorge. Instead the chipmunks, which let me get amazingly close, kept me company.

My original plan was to mostly hike because I’m still coming back from having a very nasty disease. But once I ran up the first hill, I was hooked and ran almost the entire way except the stairs and the steepest part of the final mile.

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I headed to the U-Pick garden at Stick & Stone Farm in Trumansburg and picked these herbs including lemon balm, mint, chives and more! I forgot my bag and had to carry them in my shirt:

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Beautiful morning for a gorge run! SO MUCH SPONGY MOTH CATERPILLAR POOP. Glad I wore my visor, but I wish I had a face mask. Be careful out there, kids.

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Followed up my run with a bronx bagel and cold brew coffee from CTB on the commons - the only reason I run is for the post-run breakfast sandwich.

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we ran the Taughannock course again, but first we took a little walk along the lake to scope it out. I snapped a couple pics while Anne talked to a fisherman and extracted all his fishing secrets -he’s fishing for lake trout and salmon, using sawbellies (a landlocked form of an alewife) for bait. He casts far out, where the water is deep. So his bait is 60-80 ft down, where the big fish like to hang out.

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after the run we went into T’burg to the Main Street Market and sat at one of their outdoor tables and ate the most delicious tacos !! and watched the world go by

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You can catch salmon in Cayuga Lake? I had no idea…

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Even though I’ve not been feeling my strongest (tight hamstrings, vacation, illness in the house…), I decided I needed to give Taughannock an attempt at a faster run. It was definitely a challenge to pick this run over blueberry picking which opens today at Hall’s Hill but I figured I would take tomorrow off to get an early start in the blueberry patch. Since I am leading (go figure?) the trail runners for the Finger Lakes Trail Club County Hike #4 on Saturday, 11.4 miles, I figured it was best to run Taughannock today and rest tomorrow by picking blueberries. On Sunday I will head out of town for another week and who knows what the start of August will bring.

Being a master at delayed gratification, my strategy was to start at the opening to the waterfall trail and head up the North Rim stairs first. This way I got the stairs/big hill over with and I got to finish fast on the slight down of the Fall’s trail. Conditions were not ideal as it was very humid but luckily not too hot and I even got sprinkled on a few times. The trail is in excellent condition and I probably didn’t need the bug spray I had applied.

I treated myself to a cool down walk out the Falls, since I didn’t allow myself time to few it on the actual run. Not much water. I wonder if we are in an official drought yet?

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Next I headed to Greenstar where I treated myself again, this time to a Green Goddess smoothly before doing a big shop.

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Story

For some reason I’d been dreading this course it’s the farthest from home and also the hills!
Arrived in parking lot around 730 nice cool morning. Sten pulled in the parking area right behind me we took one quick glance at each other and said “finger lakes challenge”. Yes! Sten took off and we wished each other well. I had never been to the upper falls overlook so that was a nice item to add to my Ithaca sights! The run felt pretty good, I hiked the stairs and a few power hike breaks on the up hill back to the finish.

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Stopped at Ithaca Bakery for a Cappuccino and a San Diego Bagel which I had never had it it’s cream cheese with raspberry jalapeno jam …yummy!

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