Earlier this month Heather and I decided to sign up for the North Face Endurance Challenge. Last year was the first year the series came to Canada at our local ski resort, Blue Mountain. Though I signed up for the event last year I ended up living out west for the summer and was unable to participate. Heather and I are both currently working at the resort so how could we pass it up this year? Heather said we could use it as our try something new, a trail race, and my first instinct was that that would be cheating after all, we are runners. So with two weeks before race day we signed up and decided to meet after work to run the course. I had briefly looked it up online and had an idea of where it followed. The event has a range of distances including a 5km, 10k, half marathon, marathon, 50km and 50 miler. We signed up for the 5km because this is a whole new ballgame for us. We decided to just dip our toes in to the whole trail running experience, or so we thought.
So the day we planned to meet up was a rainy Tuesday. By rainy Tuesday I mean it rained all day long. Many people advised us to be careful and we sloughed it off like a motherly warning. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We set out to run the trail and lasted a mere minute tops before we had to walk. We attempted to follow the signage for “the grind” trail but apparently missed it and headed straight up the ski run. I should mention this run is a green run and for those of you unfamiliar with ski run colour coding that means it’s the easiest run type. Heading straight up it on a rainy day was the furthest thing from easy. Our calves and lungs burned. I thought I was dying. This was the worst thing we could do with our time and why would we ever be so stupid to sign up were thoughts running through my mind at the time.
That was until we started to head downhill.
Downhill has always been my weakness, where some people can just fling themselves down a mountain I have to cautiously go. I know it’s mostly mental but I fear I won’t be able to stabilize myself. Add in the fact that it was slippery, muddy and the trail has many wooden stairs and you have a very slowly moving me.
I finished this practice run feeling very low and like there was no way I’d be able to successfully complete this race. Maybe trail running wasn’t for me and I should stick to road running.
But we gave it another go! We trained on the course 3 more times. Thankfully it got better when the weather was nicer (not slick muddy trails) and we were able to actually find the proper trail that twisted and turned through the trees alongside the ski run making the elevation gain seem much less brutal. My downhill even improved as I gained confidence in my legs ability to brace and move. It actually started to resemble more than a tip toe walk and somewhere closer to a run. Each of our 4 training runs increased in speed!
The big day is tomorrow but I am posting this now as I feel we have successfully tried something new for the month, maybe even more so than other months as we did it 4 times and watched our skills improve. After tomorrow’s race I will post a race review but that is separate from our try something new.
Trail running differs from road running in that you can’t plug in your headphones and forget the world. Headphones are highly discouraged for safety and the pure enjoyment of nature. The trail Heather and I have been running is deemed “multi-purpose” and the other day we encountered our first downhill biker. You always need to be aware of your surroundings.
Trail running is also much better with friends. Though one day I may run them solo, I truly enjoyed spending the time running the trails with Heather. I’m not only saying this knowing she is one of 3 people who actually read this blog (Hi Heather!) but for many reasons: 1. Safety (I may have been hit by the biker, shes much more aware) 2. Conversation and Friendship- it’s nice to spend that time with her as we both have busy lives. And 3. Encouragement. Heather and I are able to push one another in the areas where we have weakness. She has truly helped me improve my downhill capabilities as she is very strong at running downhill and very encouraging. Heather makes sure the role she plays is always beneficial to my improvement and wellbeing. I’m pretty blessed to have her as a friend, you can’t have her. She’s mine J I think it’s safe to say that this is something new we have tried that we will continue to do!
In summary I have found a new understanding, appreciation and love of trail running. Trail running feels like flying. Though I wear my GPS watch I am not concerned with the time, pacing or distance. I’ve come to accept that pacing is double what road running is (or more!) and that’s okay by me. Trail running seems to be more about the love of running. It seems so much more primal. When road running I focus on form with toes pointing forward, hips straight, shoulders straight, arms at a 90 degree angle running alongside my body. In trail running all that goes out the window, the focus is where the next step will be and avoiding any hazards and for my arms keeping my balance and sometimes grabbing trees to fling myself around the next obstacle. It brings out my inner Tarzan!
This may all sound entirely silly. I’ve discovered a new love and appreciation for a sport I already loved wholeheartedly. I’m not saying I am throwing in the towel on road running. But, every once in a while in order to refresh and recharge or if it’s a hot day, or just for a change, I am going to look up one of our local trails and go hop and jump and fling myself up and down the dirt trails.
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