I know. It’s been awhile. 

Things have been a little crazy, but in the craziness I’ve had the opportunity to really start doing something I love… trail running.

At the end of June, I had the chance to do the Ragnar Trail Race New England. I didn’t know any one on my team when we first arrived, and we quickly hit it off and had 30 hours of hills, adrenaline and fun (notice sleep isn’t in there).

I had done Reach the Beach, which is now also put on by Ragnar, and that one requires you to get friendly with 6 of your teammates as you drive a couple hours to the next transition point. You get stinky, and you get creative since you have to stretch out and live basically in a van seat.

This is where the trail one was SO much more fun. You set up camp. You get to relax after you run and take advantage of a yoga class or walk around a festival area. There was so much more a team feel to this one, since you didn’t exist on top of each other.

The trails were hard. Each loop started with ¾ mile,  1,000 ft elevation gain, climb and then split. Green was 3.5 miles, Yellow was 4.8 and Red was 6.5. I was the last runner on my team, so my order was yellow, green, red.

While the trails were hard, they were also beautiful. Northfield was the perfect location for this event, and the weather was perfect. I wouldn’t change anything about this race and I hope to have the opportunity to run it again! 

And then I hit the trails again this past weekend for the VERT Sasquatch race! It was my friend’s first race since having twins two years ago, and the 2.4 mile trail run was a memorable way to kick things off! 

Sasquatch happened about 5 miles away from where we lived, and we had trained on trails 2x’s a week leading up to it. What we didn’t plan for (since it’s New England and summer has been teasing us a little bit), was 80 degree heat by 9:00AM.

So, with temps quickly soaring, I decided to just keep myself in check. I blazed down the downhills and slowed on the inclines, and used the flats to get my breathing back on track. I can tell that I wasn’t as hydrated as I should have been, since a little over halfway through, I was smacked with nausea. The fact that I knew it was only 2.4 miles kept me going and all of a sudden it was done.

The trails were not nearly as technical as those we had trained on, and were mainly fire roads. However, the first incline had a lot of people pulling over and sucking air. 

Overall I had an amazing time and VERT puts on one heck of a race. I’m debating on signing up for their fall FellsFest, which includes a 3 mile and a 7 mile race – plus the option to do BOTH! It’s the week before Reach the Beach though, so I’m trying to make a responsible decision on whether I should run a 10 mile trail run before having to run 15 miles across NH. Thoughts?

Tomorrow I’m flying out to LA for #BlogFest, where I’ll be speaking in their Lightning Round! Can’t believe it’s finally here. Plus, stay tuned for a big announcement next Monday!