March Mileage Madness 2012

It was March Madness FCTR-style.  In other words, let's run a heck of a lot of miles. Like last year, Alex, Ean, and the May family graciously hosted the annual March Mileage Madness run.  Unlike last year, I actually ran this time.  The plan for many of us was to leave the May house bright and early, complete a full circumnavigation of Horsetooth Reservoir, and summit the 2 famous rocks (Horsetooth and Arthurs) along the way.  A 35 plus mile excursion that would be my first complete loop around "The Res".

The warm weather all week has finally got all our trails in prime condition, but thankfully it stayed cool today.  Really couldn't complain except for when the winds picked up in the afternoon.  This created a killer headwind that made the last 5 miles feel like 20.

With people taking off at different times and running various routes, I was able to hook up with lots of different people to run with, making for a very fun day out on the trails.  About 7 and a half hours out there today.  I can probably cut off an hour if I were only to count "moving" time, so really the pace was pretty decent.  The post-run BBQ and beer back at the May's provided more than enough motivation to "get er done".  Most of us found our post-run "slackline" talents to be quite poor, however.  Was it the miles or the beers?

According to my Garmin: 35.5 miles with 5706 feet of vertical.

Here are a few pics from the day.  All of my pics can be seen here.

Nick and Sam leaving Horsetooth Rock.

Pete hitting the summit of Horsetooth.



Nick C leading the charge up Westridge.

Pete, Steph, and Slush cruising down Mill Creek.

The crew atop a blustery Arthurs Rock.

Marie, Brian, and Ean entering Pineridge.

Ean showing us all how it is done on the slackline.