Trail Run Number One

I actually wrote the following post last night, but didn't get it posted. So here it is day one of week 1 of Hal Hidgon's 18 week training program. I'm excited. Now I have to hold myself to it!
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We all enjoy a little entertainment, so I’d like to share with you how NOT to accomplish a safe and happy Sunday run!

I awoke at about 7:15 am to an ill dog. I picked up the soiled throw rug, threw it outside with the dog and went back to bed. At about 8 am it began to pour rain. I decided that was my sign to sleep in and not get up for my early run. At 9:15 am I rolled out of bed, made a pot of coffee and used-up a small box of Kleenex sneezing. I was tempted to O.D. on allergy medication. My husband held me to his promise and loaded the dog and I up in the truck to head up Moscow Mountain to run trails. I ate ½ a Powerbar and gave the dog a small bite. He likes peanut butter.

After a mere 15 minutes we arrived at the bottom of a trail that my husband remembered four wheeling years ago when Moscow Mountain was open to motorized vehicles. Since being closed off to motorized vehicles, however, many of the wider trains started out with two or three “Kelly Humps,” which are mounds of dirt pushed up just high enough with small trenches on their backsides. The idea is that the average dirt road-worthy vehicle would be high-centered should they try to pursue the trail on the other side. I took my two-way radio and my dog and headed over the first abnormally large Kelly Hump. I scrambled over the next and up the third. The third was topped with a large-girthed tree across it. Once mounted at the top of the tree, a man-made Grand Canyon awaited me on the other side! Geeze these people are serious! I carefully sat down on the log and dangled my feet over hoping there was no sunning snake under the tree’s undercut. I dropped myself onto the hard-packed sandy ground and did a skid-jog down the steep side. Hands as well as feet required to get up the other side. I finally surmounted the all five Kelly Humps and headed up a steep washed-out old sand road. The dog was panting and so was I!

Eight minutes after being dropped off I made I to the make-shift parking lot, with a lot of Sunday riders’ stares. Since I had my 2-way radio, I decided to head down the main road away from home. I mumbled something about “tell the silver 4-door Dodge I’m headed to Potlatch” as I jogged by the cyclers.

Five minutes later I realized that I should not have slept in and believed the weatherman when he forecasted the area’s first HOT day of the year. It was already pushing 90°C at about 11 am. Our hottest day to-date was mid-seventy, three weeks ago.

I heard the truck rumbling up behind me, grabbed the dog by the collar, dodged off the road and climbed into the AC. I stopped my watch at 12 minutes and 54 seconds. I grabbed a sip of water. My husband offered to take me to the next trail, but I volunteered he just drop me off at a gated logging road I knew well (and was well shaded) so I could do a brief out-and-back jog. The 2-way radios were not working: forgot to charge them.

We have a nice little locally published mountain biking trail guide. Easy enough, I’ll follow this well-traveled trail to the gate at Rock Creek Road and meet Duane there. Approximately 2 miles and appears to be shaded. How hard can that be?

Let the adventure begin. I took off without the dog (he does not like heat unless there is water to swim in) and my 2-way radio. At about four minutes, I cut off the logging road and onto the trail. I ran by some pretty creative and intimidating mountain bike obstacles constructed just off the edge of the trail. Then I mounted a neat little hill to a small clearing with ankle-high grass. The trail sort of petered out into several spurs. Eight minutes and thirty seconds since Duane dropped me off the second time. I consulted the map and went left. I went down a hill, over and around some downed trees and past an old cabin I was sure I recognized from one of those off-the-wall nightmares I have occasionally. Then I snaked around, through a small bog where a stream fed a small meadow, up a hill and ended at an old decking spot. Okay, must have taken a wrong turn because I just went through a lot more than the average mountain biker would dare to.

At 24 minutes I turned around and headed back for the meadow where the well-marked trail had ended. At about thirty minutes I was back in the clearing and headed down the other well-used looking trail. Appeared more used. I ran through some waist-high tall grass and realized I did not have an inhaler or epi-pin with me. Thank goodness I did take my Claritin with that cup of coffee. However, Idaho’s blooming Timothy and pollinating pines have both managed to put me in the ER with sever allergies.

The trail was mildly sloped, but situated just right that the sun could beat down on me between the trees. At 40 minutes I was on what looked like a maintained trail, but saw no signs of meeting a road soon. Knowing that I was about 2 miles from the point where Duane had initially dropped me off, I headed back. Why risk getting further into the mountains when your lost?

At one hour and one minute I arrived back at the drop off point. I was a little freaked out about how I must now have panicked Duane. What is he thinking and where could he be waiting or looking for me at?

I had hoped for about 5 miles today. I think I definitely got that in. Not bad for the heat. I walked the ½ mile back to the parking lot, figuring it was best to be at a frequently used rendezvous point should Duane have gone looking for me. It was not long before two cyclist came up the same steep trail I had taken on my first jaunt out. I asked about seeing a silver Dodge out looking for me. Nope. One man offered me his cell phone. Whew, we had signal and I called. No answer, so I left Duane a message stating I was at the parking lot and I’d wait there. The two gentlemen agreed to ride down to where I was suppose to come out to meet Duane and let him know where I was.

An hour later a very furious Duane arrived. He never saw the cyclist or received the cell message. We yelled at each other some coming off the mountain, I think both venting the fear we had just experienced and relief now setting in.

Several hours later Duane and I made trip to Wal-Mart to grab a few necessities we just could not practically get anywhere else in this quaint town. (Yes, there is some irony in that statement.) While there we got distracted at the magazine isle. We like our reading material. I do not have a subscription to Runner’s World, so I thought I’d skim the latest issue. Humm, interesting the longest article in the magazine was about a women who spend three days stranded in Moab after taking a spill on her trail run. Duane was not impressed when I pointed it out! I should have bought that issue, but I did skim the article and how to avoid such mishaps. Communication device. I guess I should not have gone trail running with the 2-way radios were not working. Water: guess I’m gonna learn to run with some of that.

All-in-all I guess I’m lucky this go-round. I had one minor fall and my ankle is sore tonight, but there is no swelling. I was dehydrated to the point of feeling ill when I got home, but no delirium or chills. I thought I was a safe trail runner, but so did Duane when as an experienced dirt bike rider he took a spill off the same road I ran today (the main road does lead to trail that permit motorized vehicles some miles back) and ended up in the hospital for 10 days. Fortunately he crashed at just the right spot to get cell signal, and was conscious just long enough to make a cell call to a friend also on the mountain riding that day. It is for that reason we do own 2-way radios I can run with.

I just got interrupted by a call from an old running pal. I told her about my day’s adventure. She informed me that while mountain biking on Moscow Mountain a few years ago a rider came up missing and in the search she made a 911 call. Apparently there was a time when you could get the 911 answering machine. Gotta love Idaho! The moral of the story: one can never be too prepared. Run safe. Run well.