Run Course

First, I made one little amendment to the bike course.  It's marked.  When you get to the bomb shelter trail, just to the north of 71st Street, instead of turning right, you'll turn left and ascend bomb shelter (through that creek bed drop that is so fun going the other direction).  When you're almost to the parking lot, look for a trail on your right.  I weedwhacked it and marked it with ribbon.  Turn there and follow the trail through the woods and down the hill, under a fallen tree, and out to the trail that turns you left and back up to the paved River Trail.  Up to the top of the hill, left around the outside of the parking lot all the way to the field just west of the parking lot.

That's where the transition area will be.

Ray Hall rode the course a few times on Saturday.  He said it was around 12.75 km (7.92 mi), which is a tad short, but it's a good course and adding anything on would mess up the flow.  I heard another guy say it was about 8.25 miles (13.27 km), so it's somewhere in there.

The run course.

I marked the run course on Sunday with orange ribbon.  If you're riding the bike course, don't follow the orange ribbon.  

Anyway, the run goes along Elwood, same as the bike, and up the big hill to the upper parking lot.  Keep going straight past the parking lot, out the Powerline Trail.  Down some technical rocky stuff and out the dirt doubletrack until you're at the top of the very steep downhill section.  At this point, there is a trail that shoots off to your right.  I weedwhacked the path there and tied orange ribbons on, so you should see it.  Follow that trail until it meets up with the Millennium Trail.  Turn right on the Millennium and follow it up the the wider, sandier trail that heads back to the top of the mountain.  A little ways up that trail, look for markers going off to your left- on a crossover to the Ridge Trail.  It goes down through a creek bed, then turn right and run up the windy trails that take you to the main trail on top.  Turn left there (away from the upper parking lot) out to the open field.  Keep going straight all the way out to the point (a small bike course crossover there) and down a treacherously rocky hill.  We descended this hill last year.  When you get to Ho Chi, turn right for a minute and then back left.  Jump over a downed tree and descend more rocky trail all the way to the main trail that takes you right to the parking lot.  Finish line.

Or transition area if you're du-ing it.

I'll post much more info this week, so keep checking the blog.  The race is this Saturday at 9a.  And don't forget, packet pickup and late registration is this Thursday at the DoubleShot from 5-7p.  You can still register and/or pick up your race packet on race day, but I recommend you do it before then.  It helps us a lot to know how many people to expect.

Stay tuned.