Jared Campbell's Blog

LC50 - 2009 conditions. This is a "smart" runner who actually brought a jacket. Photographer : unknown

Lake City 50 – 2009

I’ve been laughed at many times for heading out on longer runs under-dressed and/or under prepared.  My response of “it’s good adversity training!” is never taken very seriously.  The honest truth is that most of the time I just space it and forget basic things like enough food, enough water, or enough clothing.  However, I think that subconsciously I like being presented with less than ideal situations and seeing how I deal with them… Well, some of that “training” paid off this past weekend at the Lake City 50 as we were all presented with a pretty crazy storm that most of us weren’t anticipating.

Last weekend I ran the Steeplechase on Saturday and had a wonderful experience on the awesome course.  I pushed harder on the road than I normally like to (roads are yucky) and I mildly tweaked my knee, right where my patellar tendon attaches to the top of the tibia.  Being behind on my training for HR100 I have been delicately walking the fine line between of putting in the necessary training and getting injured.  So, the day after Steeplechase I took to the hills and logged ~36 miles and ~12kft of vert.  Monday it was clear that I had done bad things to my knee.  Therefore, I defaulted to my trusty “injury plan” of replacing running with road biking for the next few days.  Lake City was on Saturday and based on how I was feeling I really didn’t think that I’d be running.  On Thursday I went out for a test run on the Box Spring Hollow Loop, starting/finishing at Affleck Park (it was fabulous BTW!) and the knee felt better than I anticipated.  So, Friday we (Mindy, Ryan, and myself) jumped in the car and drove to Lake City.

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Greetings SLC Runners,

On Wednesday June 24th, Pat McMurtry and I will be putting on another “voluntary trail cleanup event”, similar in nature to the Mount Olympus Wilderness Clean-Up Event from last fall.  We’re hoping for around 15-20 volunteers to run a fabulous loop around Box Spring Hollow, starting and finishing at Affleck Park.  Some basic details are below and I’ll add more later.  Let me know if you’re interested.

Note : Some folks are starting early and some folks are starting at Big Mtn, which shortens the run by 2.5 miles and has 1,500′ less vertical gain (i.e. 10.3 miles and 2,600′ of gain total).  Both are options… pick you poison.

Roch Horton and Mandy Hosford on Scout Mtn.

The first-ever Pocatello 50 Mile Trail Run  was a huge success.  The weather Gods cooperated, all the volunteers were stellar, and somehow Ryan and I managed to have enough bananas and potato chips for everyone.  We knew it wouldn’t be an easy course, but I think it turned out to be harder that most folks anticipated, some calling it one of the hardest 50 milers in the country.  We feel that the best thing about it is the stellar course, which is beautiful the entire way and has “a bit of everything”.  Runners were greeted with incrediblesingle track for the first 8 miles, followed by a brutally steep and completely off-trail climb up Wild Mtn.  A complete switch of gears was then necessary for the ripper down hill to City Creek at ~mile 18.  Another incredibly steep climb was encountered as the runners climbed up to Kinport Rd.  This section had snow, mud, and was very steep.  But, to make up for this a very fast decent down the beautiful Midnight Creek allowed runners to make up some time.  A small climb and then another fast low-angled decent brought runners to the Mink Creek Aid Station at mile 31.  The last “leg” started here, which was characterized by a long steady climband a spectacular glissade off the north face of Scout Mtn, the high point of the course.  With most runners laughing and smiling as they descended the snow they then jumped onto the perfect single-track of the Crestline Trail which took them to the final aid station, Big Fur.  A bit of road and one last climb left the finish line only a couple miles away.  The final downhill is a beautiful single-track and was quietly tucked away in a side-canyon that few visit. 

Based on the overwhelmingly positive response, Ryan and I are already planning out next year’s race.  Registration will likely open up on January 1st, 2010.

More photo here

Local Pocatello story here

Grandeur Peak Fun Run Course

On May 16th Erik Storheim of the MRC put on the 3rd annual Grandeur Peak Fun Run.  This is a great 10 mile loop with about 4,000′ of vertical gain and is a route that I run quite often.  The course starts with a lovely march up Grandeur’s brutally steep west side, which gains 3,400′ in 1.9 miles!  I lead to the top with Drew Erickson and Aaron Brown (2002 Steeplechase 2:18!) right behind me the entire way.  We reached the summit in 48 minutes, a decent time, but still about 8 minutes slower than my fastest time ever.  Side note : several years ago I had a personal challenge of doing a vertical mile (5,280′) in under 60 minutes.  On grandeur west-side this amounts to ~39 minutes, something that I worked my butt of to do and eventually did.  In doing so, however, I severly damaged my right achilled tendon, an injury that still plagues me today.  As such, I’ve abanoded this goal….   Once on the summit, we immediately transitioned into downhill mode as we drop ~2500′ down to the pipeline trail.  I maintened the lead until we hit the pipeline at which point the two dudes behind me showed me that I’m not a fantastic flat runner.  I tried pretty hard to catch them and stayed close behind until the last very steep climb above Rattlesnake Gulch.  Ahhh… steep uphill again.  I caught and passed Aaron and then put less then 1 minute between Drew and myself at finish line.  I posted a time of 1:47 a time I was happy with given my limited training this season. 

At the finish line Erik Storheim fired up the grill and we enjoyed pancakes, OJ, and various other breakfast items as I watched all my other friends and family members finish this great event.  Mindy posted a fabulous 2:26 and  Brendan was not far behind with a 2:35.  Teresa started at Church Fork and ran to the finish.  She looked great at the finish line despite taking a pretty good digger and scraping up her knee.

Thanks Erik for a great event.

Results here

April 25th, 2009 was the Bonneville Shoreline Marathon (BoSho), a wonderfully quiet event that draws many folks from trail running community in SLC and surrounding areas.  This is one of the many local races that I had never run, oddly enough.  I decided to change this.  I talked Vanessa into doing the first 10 miles in a 100% off-the-couch status, and Mindy was for the full marathon.  We met in the morning and drove to the start line, which we arrived at several minutes late!   So, that meant I’d be playing catch-up for most of the race.  It’s kind of fun, I realized, starting at the very back of the pack because I got to see so many friends as I tried to weave my way forward in the pack. 

This race is spectacular, and the weather was PERFECT!  Now, my definition of “perfect” is likely different than most people’s, but I loved the rain, mud, and heavy fog/clouds that were with us for much of the race.  Early on (mile 6?) I took a wrong turn that it turns out many others did as well… oh well, I didn’t lose too much time and got to see trails I had never seen before.  At mile 10 I met up with Ty Draney and would end up running the rest of the race with him.  We had a great time chatting and turned it into a nice friendly run as the miles quickly ticked by.  I was excited for the final climb out of Dry Creek as I had heard it was “steep”!   It was indeed and was essentially a river for the first mile or so.  We hiked to the top of the ridge and then turned downhill and cruised into the finish line together in 4:19, good for 3rd place behind Karl and Christian Johnson.

I was in awe at what a great run this had been.  I fear, however, that the regulatory powers that be will try to shut it down, which would be a real shame given how lightly these runners tread.

Read Ty’s write-up here

Results here