Mt Tam steps it up. And down.

I know that I was just here, two weeks ago, with Mrs Notthat running the PCTR Stinson Beach race. But we could only do the short distance due to time constraints, which makes coming back so soon to run the ITR Mt Tam race (which uses some of the same trails) perfectly reasonable.

Mrs Nothat is busy teasing cabana boys on a beach in Mexico, so sadly she missed out on this opportunity to see some of the best trails in the Bay Area. I signed up for the 30K since it covered almost all of the race's trails with few repeats. It would be the longest distance I had done since Rocky Ridge, so I had some concern (well founded, it turned out) about how I would do, but I also knew I would have all the time I needed to get it done.

Enibas (not her real name) is offering to help the ITR Owl grab the bullhorn from All Day. Trail racing can get complicated.

All Day had been up most of the night marking the trails (this area suffers from frequent vandalism when courses are marked the day before a race, so marking it the night before the race seemed like a good idea). All Day was also running the 50K event today. All of which caused alarm when he grabbed the bullhorn and began explaining how he had started naming the ribbons at about 1 AM (but found determining their sex to be challenging).

Photo by ITR volunteer, very early in the race. That woman beat me by over one and a half hours.

There were several photographers along the course, and I can't resist being a dork in front of them. The ironic bit is that shortly after this picture was taken, I was making that face for real when I, along with a few others, were attacked by a number of agitated yellow jackets. I got stung twice in one calf and had a third bee desperately trying to sting my gloved (fortunately) left hand. The good news was that the bees apparently mellowed quickly (this is Marin County after all) and didn't bother many other runners.

The Steep Ravine trail is glorious. I've said it before, but it's worth saying again - you really must do a race out of Stinson Beach at some point if you have never tried it before. It is challenging but well worth it.

Enibas on the infamous ladder. I was trying hard to keep up with her so that I could get more pictures with real runners in them (usually I'm so far behind it's just me and maybe a lost tourist or two).

Enibas making her way through the tall trees. I just plain love this trail.

The 50K and 30K runners started at 8:30, with the Half Marathon and 10K runners starting at 9:00. I had a goal of making it to the first aid station (Cardiac Hill, mile 3.7) without being passed by any of the later start runners.

Ha.

I started getting passed at about mile 2.5. Here Asil (not her real name) smiled and waved as she blew past, on her way to a great 10K finish (first woman, fourth overall).

The Cardiac Hill aid station is fun because, when you reach it, you know you've got some downhill ahead of you. All runners, except the 10K runners, would see this aid station at least twice (50K runners hit it four times).

One part of the race I was really looking forward to was the loop through the Muir Woods National Monument. The trails in and out of that place were awesome.

As you can see it was a wonderful day. Cool, but sunny with no wind or fog at all. The course had us cross through one end of the park's tourist area, climb a tough hill, then come back down and cross the other end of the park.

I was amazed at the number of cars fighting for a parking space there. Muir Woods is a great place to visit, but it was still reasonably early and I wouldn't have thought it would be so busy. I learned later that this was Free National Parks Day, which led to a massive number of cheapskates trying to cram into the park at the same time.

I had a great time smiling as I dodged the cars through a parking lot and got back on a trail.

About as "no frills" as a bridge can be.

A bit after leaving that parking lot I arrived at the second aid station, Deer Park. This was mile 10.1 for me. That guy in the yellow, Roel (not his real name), is on his way to winning the 50K. He has run 24.2 miles in the amount of time it took me to get here. Wow.

(Parking note: The right side of this approach to Muir Woods was packed with parked cars. The volunteers at this aid station kept getting blamed for holding a race on a free parks day and taking up all these parking spaces. In real life, they had taken up two - the one with the awning and one for their vehicle. The people in cars had a hard time grasping the fact that the race was based out of Stinson Beach. "But that's not even close to here!" No kidding.)

Not long after I left the aid station I was passed by the second place 50K runner. After that, it was a bit of time before I was passed again.

The trail goes right across this field, then starts up that hill on the left. K-Dub ended up getting flattened here by a dog whose moronic owner thought it would be fun to throw the ball out in front of K-Dub.

When you leave Deer Park, you have a reasonably flat stretch for a mile or two. It's hard to enjoy it though since you know you have a serious climb coming up.

While going up the hill in the below picture, these turkey buzzards kept flying over my head. I was ready to defend the frogs on my hat to the death if it came down to it. Which would probably suit the buzzards just fine. They were huge!

We came up that switchback-infested trail. The odd thing was that I kind of liked it - it was a bit tedious  but the switchbacks meant the trail wasn't very steep, which is what was mattering at that point to my tired legs.

Blue ribbons indicate a trail is out of bounds. All Day was a bit punchy towards the end of his course marking in the wee hours of the morning and decided this table was out of bounds too. (Too bad because I could have used a nice sit about now.)

Flamingos! That can only mean one thing…

… the Cardiac Hill aid station is near! The three runners you see here are all heading out to finish their 20K loop for their 50K race. For me though, I only had 2.9 miles left, and it was mostly downhill. I had very little energy left, but I still left here with a bit of spring in my step (which sprang out after a few hundred yards).

The view of San Francisco from shortly after that aid station. Stunning.

I've been on bits of the infamous Dipsea trail before. It is known for having a lot of steps and a lot of climbing. There is a very popular race on the trail that sounds fun, and there are double and quad versions of the race that must be twice and four times as much fun. Now that I've been on more of the trail I'm thinking the good old fashioned single version might be the only one I'd have a chance of surviving.

Going down these steps while you are tired is much harder than it sounds. Coming back up them would be even harder.

In any case, I eventually managed to get down those steps, broke free of the forest, and spied Stinson Beach. There is still a ways to go, but it's close enough that my pace picked up. (At least it did in my mind.)

And then there was the finish line. Finally.

I love these trails - great variety with everything you could possibly want, as long as you don't want boring, flat, paved roads. 

This is the elevation chart my GPS device showed me after the race. Not a lot of flat there.

I was the dead last 30K finisher (by a significant amount). And I was happy with that. While I was tired, and could still feel the stings from the yellow jackets, I was in pretty good shape. (Better than one of my Hokas, which had a part of its sole separate from the rest of the shoe about 13 miles into this race. Shouldn't these things have lasted more than 350 miles?)

There were a lot of running friends that took part in this race, and all did well - even K-Dub, once she was able to determine that most of her important body parts were still working after being clocked by that poodle, managed a big smile at the finish.

(Man. I'm really going to regret that poodle crack.)

That's it - move along…

PS: Click here to see more of my pictures.

Getting scruffy on Diablo

Sunday was one of the first times I've done an event at Mt Diablo where the weather and trails were pretty much perfect. So naturally I downgraded from the Half Marathon to the 10K.

Starting Thursday, a cold moved into my body and knocked me for a bit of a loop. By Sunday I was feeling OK, but knew I wouldn't be able to handle the hills of the Half so I did something I had never done before - I downgraded to the 10K at the Brazen Diablo Trails Adventure.

Not that the 10K isn't without hills.

See those two pimples on the left? The 10K goes over them out to about mile four then makes a mad dash (or slow shuffle in my case) back to the finish. The two pimples add up to over 1200 feet of climbing though, and are much more challenging that this makes them look.

This race is known for its many creek crossings, although this time of year, you have to work a bit to get your feet wet. (I managed to do that.)

There was a large turnout for all of the distances which helped make this a lot of fun.

This is the what the 10K runners were dreaming of - a dash down this last hill, a left out to the turnaround, and then an easy run to the finish. No more pimples to climb!

Funny story number one about this race; this is Hteb (not her real name) who does a great blog thing (here is a link to her report on this race). I had passed her going up the last pimple, but as I had predicted, she blew past me on the downhill and finished well ahead of me. The funny thing was that, as she was heading in, she convinced a young guy to push a bit and finish hard. The guy asked her if "that scruffy guy" was her husband.

I asked her if she thought he was talking about me, and she thinks so, since I had talked to her several times on the course and made a point of getting her picture each time. This is WAY too funny and cool. (And how knicknames get started.)

Photo of a scruffy guy taken by a Brazen volunteer.

"YIKES! Get back and give the scruffy guy a LOT of room"

A cool thing as I headed to the finish was seeing all the family hikers on the trail. Part of this event was a non-competitive family hike, many led by Save Mt Diablo volunteers who explained the various things that makes this park so amazing.

Once I finished, I headed back out a bit so that I could pace Mrs Notthat into the finish since I figured she would be on her own and tired and in need of some perkiness. And then she showed up as part of this group and flew past me. "Pace her in." Right. (She has run this Half twice before, albeit under extreme weather conditions each time, and this time she beat her course PR by nearly a hour. She was more than up for this race!)

Funny story number two; my daughter, Weird Haired Mom (who more accurately should be Mom of Weird Haired Kids) asked me if I had been in any of the porta-potties yet. So naturally I spent some quality time going through them.

After a few hits and misses, I went into this one.

And saw this. For reasons that are not totally clear, if you Google "porta-pottie" you will get my picture. (Not really, but how cool would that be!) Someone at last year's race here left me a message. Even cooler, the Porta-Pottie Maintenance Professionals left the note there. Nobody has owned up to doing this, and the FBI was not interested in doing a handwriting analysis to try and pin it down.

This. Was. AWESOME! (And would have been missed without WHM's keen eye.)

And that's about it. The shirt and medal featured a famous Mt Diablo tarantula (which several runners saw on the course - this is the end of their mating season and the warm weather gets them active). The whole event was amazing - the course, the many enthusiastic volunteers (including about a dozen photographers - there are a ton of pictures up here), the great barbecue, the Save Mt Diablo people, and of course all of the fun runners and hikers.

And today I just saw a picture of a snow covered Mt Diablo - the weather has changed a lot in just a few days.

That's it - move along…

PS: You can see a lot more of my pictures here.

Zombies + Darkness = Fun

When I first saw that Coastal Trail Runs was putting on a Half Marathon on a Wednesday night, I was a bit more excited than you would think. I'm not a night person and knew I would be finishing at about the time I normally head to bed. All this after being at work all day.

But I've done a night race in this area before (Palo Alto Moonlight Run) and remembered it as being fun. And since Zombie Runner was involved, there would be medals (and as it turned out, Zombie Runner hats!).

So I signed up.

There were quite a few costumes - many that looked highly inappropriate for a trail race.  Some that were burned into my poor brain forever.

Oh, and it was on Halloween.

Yes, that's someone in a Dodgers uniform wisely hanging close to a nun. On the same day as the Giants World Series parade. Ha ha ha ha.

It was just starting to get dark at about the time the race started. There was also a rain storm threatening the event, but forecasters (who weirdly turned out to be right) said the rain would hold off until the race was over. If only they knew how slow I was.

I loved that these two stood in the dusk with this sign at about the 2.3 mile point.

This was the first aid station. It's really starting to get dark now.

The course was marked with light sticks on each of the trail ribbons, which made following the course no problem. The course was also an out-and-back which meant it should look at least a bit familiar on your return.

The trail was fairly smooth, so finding good footing in the dark was not that hard. Many runners didn't have headlamps or flashlights, and seemed to be doing fine. There was a nearly full moon, and even with the clouds, it provided enough light to be helpful. (I used a headlamp since I figured otherwise I would stumble into the one pothole on the entire course.)

The Half Marathon turnaround, at a bit over 7 miles. Yes, this meant the course was an ultra Half Marathon.

I took some pictures on the way out to the turnaround, but quickly realized that they were not going to come out well. So I ended up taking no pictures from the turnaround back to the finish.

A cool thing was that I caught up with the Trekie at the turnaround and we stayed together all the way back to the finish.

Compared to the darkness of the trail, the finish line looked like Las Vegas.

The coolest bit of the race was about a mile from the finish - the Trekie and I managed to pass the Dodger and the nun. I was pretty tired, so I restrained myself from taunting or tripping the Dodger (the nun made me a bit nervous too - anyone that can run a Half Marathon with all that clothing on is someone to be reckoned with).

And that's about it. The race was a blast! The costumes were awesome. The weather was perfect - there were a few sprinkles over the last couple of miles, but nothing to worry about.

And I'm pretty sure the zombies went home hungry.

That's it - move along…

PS: You can see more of my pictures here.

Stinson Beach comes through again

The thing about Stinson beach is that it's a long ways away (well over an hour for us) and a lot of the drive is on a narrow windy road filled with road bikes, and this time, with road construction equipment.

But then you get there, see the beautiful beach, and know that, for the next few hours, you are going to be on some of the most stunning trails in California. I've done one other race out of Stinson Beach and have been dying to come back and do another. The problem with this particular Saturday was that we had to be back shortly after noon, so Mrs Notthat and I decided to do the short distance (12K that ended up being nearly a 13K - BONUS!) of the PCTR Stinson Beach trail race and be happy with that.

This was also our first race with the newly reborn PCTR and I was anxious to see how it would go. (Spoiler alert: It went great.)

Looking at the list of pre-registered runners, I saw only one name that I knew - Ffoeg (not his real name). Ffoeg cannot resist a trail run in the Marin Headlands, so it wasn't a surprise to see him here.

A great surprise was seeing Anoda (not her real name) here too! Ffoeg did the 50K, so I knew we wouldn't see him again once the race started. Anoda was doing the 25K. I doubted we would see her again since we would have to leave soon after I shuffled across the finish line, and as slow as I am, I figured I would still be able to finish my 12K before she finished her 25K. Maybe.

The race started with an enthusiastic burst up a short paved road followed by a halt on Highway 1 while we squeezed onto the actual trail.

We spent most of the first half of the race going uphill on the aptly named Steep Ravine trail. The trail wanders along a noisy creek in an amazingly lush forest.

We had a bit of rain earlier in the week, but the weather seems to have little impact here. The trail was damp, but not muddy, and while the sun was shining brightly, in here you were drenched in cool shadows.

The Steep Ravine trail is infamous for its ladder. It's not a long ladder, but it does add a fun element to the course.

Yes - the trail goes right between those two trees.

After about three miles of climbing, you come out of the woods at the Pantol Ranger Station. Normally, this is where the aid station would be, but the Park Service has decided that it added too much congestion to this area (there are a LOT of people that come out and hike these trails), so a bonus out-and-back bit was added to our 12K.

The first cool thing about the out-and-back was that it meant I would get to see how far ahead of me Mrs Notthat was. The simple answer was "not that far"- the more correct answer was "it doesn't matter since she is going to blow me away on the downhill that's next."

I love that this aid station is at the  top of Cardiac Hill.

The second cool thing about the out-and-back was that we were rewarded with some great views. The weather was stunning - completely clear with very mild temperatures.

That pink loop of ribbon on the trail marked the location of a nest full of enthusiastic wasps. It was wise to give them a wide berth.

After making it back to the Pantol area, we crossed a road and then spent some time running along a ridge that was determined to distract you with gorgeous views.

The ridge is followed by going back through that forest, this time downhill on the amazing Matt Davis trail. This trail is steeper than the Steep Ravine trail, and has many switchbacks that are infested with steps. And roots. LOTS of roots. Anyone thinking they are going to make up a lot of time blasting down this trail is likely to be surprised (and maybe a bit bloody at the finish line). I had no chance of winning, so I took my time and enjoyed the scenery.

Before long I was at the finish line and my race was done.

Mrs Notthat beat me by a little over ten minutes. She also managed to become "one with the trail" (weirdly, during a relatively flat section - not the steep meat grinder part).

Just as I'm busy patting myself on the back for not getting beat by any of the 25K runners, in came the first place man followed closely by Anoda (I ended up beating her by a whole eight minutes. Sheesh.)

If you are a trail runner and have never done a race up here, you really need to add it to your to-do list (and hope really hard that the RD is able to arrange great weather like we had). If you aren't a trail runner, you still need to get out here and spend a day on these trails. Stinson Beach is a fun little town, there is a large parking lot and many fun places to eat.

The PCTR people and volunteers were all great and the course was well marked. We had a great time and are looking forward to coming back to do a longer distance.

That's it - move along…

PS: You can see more of my pictures from the race here.