Northville-Placid Trail (NPT) Supported Record Attempt - June 2015

Date TBD in mid-June 2015
~135 miles from Lake Placid to Northville, NY (Southbound)
Current Record 39 hr 16 min

The Northville-Placid Trail (NPT) was my first solo thru-hike back in high school.  I spend 6 days hiking from Upper Benson (near Sacandaga Lake) up to the the TH on Averyville Rd., just ourside of Lake Placid.  My sister dropped me off with my pack containing all of my provisions for nearly a week and my mom picked me up late in the morning at the end of the trail on the 6th day.  It was my first real test of endurance, both mental and physical, where I covered anywhere from 17-23 miles a day.  The trail is by no means super hilly.  It does not summit any peaks, but at the same time it is not a fast trail by any means due to the typical Adirondack rocks, roots, and mud!  It travels through some remote country, passes beautiful ponds, and one section is 32 miles between road crossings.

I am attempting a supported run on the NPT, which means that Hillary (and others!) can resupply me with nutrition, equipment (i.e. lights), or whatever along the way.  I can drop things off and grab what I need.  With that said this trail is remote and there are not a lot of places to refuel.  I may be alone for up to 7 hours at a time, so I will need to carry enough calories and electrolyte (Nuun!) to supply me over that amount of time.

I will be attempting the record on the ENTIRE trail.  There is about 1.25 miles of road at the Lake Placid end of the trail and about 7 miles of road on the Northville end.  Some of the historical attempts have only included the trail portion of the trail, but there is a push by the NPT Chapter to construct the last few miles of trail to Northville in the near future.  In the last year they have already put in a number of trail miles and diverted the route around Upper Benson, which is the tradition trail section start.  Since I think the future attempts will be on a full trail, my attempt will also be on the full distance.  There have been many trail changes, reroutes, extensions over the life on the NPT, so I realize that any record is really on that specific configuration, which is bound to change again in the future.  The trail has been around for over 90 years, so there are bound to be changes.

As pointed out at fast known times the current record holder is Sheryl Wheeler in 2011 for both the trail portion (35 hr 13 min) and the entire trail (39 hr 16 min).  Since the NPT no longer passes through Upper Benson (the trail portion ending point of Sheryl's record setting run I will attempt the entire trail.  I will also be going southbound as was pursued by most of the previous attempts.

I am looking at an 8am start on the day I see as a good weather window and hope to finish in under 35 hours if all goes well.  Below is a hypothetical table of road crossings and aid points if I finished in 30 hours, or a 13.6 minutes per mile pace, which would be the fastest I could imagine.  Really who knows!  Start time may change.

Start - Lake Placid (Mile 0)                    8 AM
Trailhead Averyville Rd. (Mile 1.25)     8:20 AM
Shattuck Clearing (Mile 27.9)                2:20 PM
Long Lake/Rte 28N (Mile 38.1)             4:35 PM
Durant Lake CG Rte 28/30 (Mile 52.8)  8:00 PM
Wakely Dam (Mile 64.8)                        10:45 PM
Piseco (Mile 97.6)                                   6:00 AM (next day)
Whitehouse (Mile 106.5)                         8:00 AM
End of trail, County Rte 6 (Mile 125.4)  12:20 PM
Finish - Northville Bridge (133 miles)    2:00 PM

For detailed information on the trail, including an interactive map see the NPT Chapter

One week until Infinitus 88k

Next Saturday May 30th is Infinitus!  The event is put on by the Endurance Society and has distances from 8k to 888k, and has a 48 hour and 72 hour race.  I will be participating in the 88k, or about 54.5 miles.  The race is sure to be hilly and on tough Vermont trails.  Many are snowmobile trails and some of the climbs are sure to be steep.  It will not be a fast race, so it will be important to take my time at the beginning.  The aid stations are pretty spread out and I will really only be able to resupply with my own nutrition at miles 30 and 40.  In between there are limited aid stations, so I will be carrying a lot of Nuun tabs to hydrate effectively, especially the first 30 miles.  Hillary will be running Girls on the Run with her group from Fair Haven in Rutland in the morning, so hopefully I will see her around mile 30.  I hope to make the top three in this race, but I will certainly not be out front at the start.  The plan is to take it at a comfortable speed for the first 25 miles, refuel at 30, and then see what I can do.  Either way it will be a long day, 12 hours, 15??? tough to say!

http://www.endurancesociety.org/infinitus/

Bear Mountain 50 miler - North Face ECSNY

North Face Endurance Challenge Series - New York
Bear Mountain 50 Miler (7,054' elevation gain)
May 2, 2015
8 hours 14 minutes; 6th place overall

Overview
This is the second time I have ran the Bear Mountain 50, but I was a bit under trained this year as compared to last year.  It was easy to forget how hard the last 10 miles or so of this course are and how taxing the first 20 are on your legs.  I came in to this race averaging under 40 miles per week and with some legs issues only ran 2-3 times a week for the 3.5 weeks leading up to race time.  All in all I would say this race was a success for me to end up 6th overall, but left a sour taste realizing I could have potentially ended up in the top three if I was better prepared.  It was hot and the Nuun kept me well hydrated as I sweat like crazy!!  It was a great start to the season!

Leading up to race day

This year our semester at Castleton started a week earlier in January meaning we end a week earlier.  Hillary and I left from Castleton in the afternoon of the last day of school scrambling to get down to Stoney Point before dark.  I had been dealing with some tendinitis in my right quad ever since a backcountry ski and climb up the Trap Dike on Mount Colden and was unsure how my leg would respond to the long race and debilitating rocky trail surface of Bear Mountain.  I went in the race morning humble and hoping for the best!

Starting the race

I didn't feel great, but did not feel awful either for the first 20 miles of the race.  I was a bit behind schedule and knew I was not going to make my time from the year prior.  No worries though, my quad was feeling good, so I was glad I would be able to make a good push.  I ran the first couple hours with Tom Dillon of Fort Collins, who was a great buddy to run with and pass by some miles as we caught runners ahead of us.  The are a lot of tough rocky sections early on in this course that really wear on you later in the race.

Miles 20-40, or so ...

This is the faster part of the course.  There are some atv type trails that are not super steep and wider grassy trails that are not too tough either.  I was definitely feeling pretty beaten down through this section though and could not make up time on these faster sections.  It was 80 degrees out, I was pounding down up to 50 ounces of Nuun water per hour and was still starting to cramp a bit and had to supplement further with salt stick pills starting at mile 33.  Without Nuun I would have been salting back at mile 10!  I know I sweat very, very salty, so Nuun is essential for me to stay on top of my salt requirements, especially on a hot day.  I was also consuming more calories than normal.  All indicators that I was not as prepared as I should have been fitness-wise.  I kept my head down

and kept moving forward, packing down calories, and pounding at least 20 ounce bottles of Nuun per hour.

The last 10 miles
The course gets back to its true form of rocky trails for this section.  A couple epic climbs on top of it really drained me.  However, it is always uplifting to hit the intersection that also has the 50k runners on it.  Prior to that I was running along for a long time.  It is nice to pick off people and have small goals again.  My body was certainly not used to the heat and I was close to feeling the starting symptoms of slight dizziness and nausea as I crossed the line.  I was burning really hot.  However, I was able to keep food down the entire race.

Overall, I was very pleased with the effort and am really thankful to Hillary for supporting me all day, especially since I wasn't the most energetic person during the race.  I am looking forward to Infinitus 88k at the end of May and the Northville-Placid Trail record attempt in June!