Rocks and Rollers

September 20 marked Dave and Craig’s first digitally-imaged Green Hour training run. And the acronym for that is? Eight miles through Lake Fairfax Park in northern Virginia felt and looked just like a 16 mile run I’d done two weeks ago outside of Montpelier, Vermont. Cool. Breezy. A few trees beginning to color. Decidedly un-Virginia from a climate perspective. Just about perfect for running. Except for the day in day out natural hazards of trail running.

Our JFK 50 Miler route takes us over 14 miles of the Appalachian Trail between Maryland’s Rt. 40 east of Boonesboro to the Potomac River downstream of Harper’s Ferry. What does that part of our journey look like? ROCKS! Ouch! A level 1 ankle buster.

Just to compound what abuse our ankles are taking add rollers --see that top photo? --to the rocks. It’s fall and our woods here at NWF headquarters and the woods atop South Mountain along the Appalachian Trail are filled with oaks. This year, as happens every 3-4 years, the oaks have produced a reproductive bonanza, swamping the acorn eaters, from weevils to squirrels, wild turkeys, black bears and white-tailed deer, with so many large, oval vegetable ball-bearings that they’ll all eat well and many of these treacherous orbs—for runners—will sprout into young oak seedlings by this time next year. A level 2 ankle buster.

Come November 18 atop the mountain, the rocks will be there as well the acorns. Add to this recipe a fine coating of fallen leaves, extra slippery from morning dew or more diabolically, a frost or ice layer and you’ve got a perfect storm, level 5 ankle buster.

You gotta love it!