Good news, @Challengers! With coordination and management by NYS Parks, FLRC is funding a porta-potty on the Black Diamond Trail at Kraft Road, which is just a bit past the turnaround point for those starting the Black Diamond Park to Park course from Cass Park. We hope to have news of another porta-potty on another FLRC Challenge trail course in the next week or two.
With that business (sorry) out of the way, we have three finishers this week to congratulate, bringing our total to nine. John Hummel now holds the title as oldest finisher at age 66, followed by Patrick Milano, who’s our youngest finisher so far at age 33 and parlayed his tenth course into three leaderboard spots: first in Most Points for men, second in Most Miles, and third in Age Grade. Also finishing this week was Jilene Demont, who took the top spot in Most Points for women and second place in Age Grade.
Although our mileage was down a bit this week, we’ve cracked the 4000-mile mark with almost 1000 runs. Interestingly, the split between men and women is much more even this year, with slightly more women running and logging a few more miles, but men recording more runs. Nice to see a balance!
We’re now at 157 participants, with only 4 more to add to surpass last year’s total. Keep encouraging friends, relatives, and strangers you meet on the trail (thanks, Gretchen Gilbert!) to sign up for the Challenge, and maybe we can exceed 2021’s 193 participants.
Great photos this week, and I can’t resist sharing three. First is Jean-Luc Jannink’s shot of the iconic Stockholm Stadion, where he ran a Sweet 1600. (His next post in that thread is of a track in Lausanne, Switzerland—he’s firmly in the lead for Farthest Track this year.)
And Ruth Sproul has been taking a bunch of great photos, including this fantastic view of clouds over Cayuga Lake from the Lakefront Loops course. (Bambi features in that run too.)
Finally, Iris Packman and Lynsay Ayer are dressing for success in this “before” shot from Lime Hollow, but you’ll have to click through to see the “after” shot. The snapping turtle was not responsible.
Don’t miss our Lime Hollow group run on Sunday, with a carpool meeting at Cornell’s B Lot by the Vet School to help shorten the drive. The weather should be gorgeous, the trails are lovely, and the company is top-notch. Be sure to vote in the pace and carpool polls so we can make plans (mmm, post-run snacks). See you there!