Burgundy filling removal service and a return to Polonium viscosum.

On early Wednesday morning, I skinned up Snowbowl for a few solo laps on our local Springuary snowpack.  I managed to shave 5 minutes off of my previous time for 1h10m to the top of Point Six.  The 800' NE face of Point Six offered excellent sparse tree skiing with good quality firm old powder into Burgundy basin.  Next, I skinned up the headwall and up Burgundy ridge to the first open shot and dropped in.  I did this at 9AM, and the corn was still quite hard.  Like concrete really, and the previous week's worth of canoe tracks left by afternoon slackcountry enthusiasts made the whole thing quite the jarring ride.  The ski out via Jenny bowl was about as bad (with more trees), but the ice made for fast travel conditions, and I was back at the truck just before 11, for a total of 4800' done in around three and a half hours.  P.S.:  learn to kick-turn, you shuffling Fritschi-wielders.  You know who you are.

I exchanged working Friday for Saturday, and joined Casey for the long Bitterroot classic of Gash Point to Sky Pilot.  After whiteout conditions on top of the primary objective and an epic midday bonk made last year's version of this tour less than ideal, I was looking forward to a shot at completing this in better time and better style.  We left the truck at 6:36, and quickly reached the upper Gash Creek trailhead on the icy boot pack/skin track (depending on the time of day).  Above this, icy conditions and sparse coverage made skinning the (lack of a) skin track frustrating until reaching the Gash Point approach ramp.  Once upon level ground, the firm snow made for fast going, and we summited Gash Point just over two hours into the day, stopping for a moment on the ascent to admire the sunrise over the Anacondas, far to the Southeast.

On the route to Bear Lake, we decided to traverse only when the fall line riding was not good (though generally tending west), which turned out to be an ideal tactic, as there is an abundance of south facing glades that empty upon a low angle bench that delivers the careful rider directly to the lake with a relative absence of calf burning sidehilling.

From Bear Lake to the base of the North face was strenuous, involving alot of steep and icy sidehilling with harscheisen.  This tour would have been miserable without them.  I advise all objective-minded splitboarders to pick up a pair (the Spark R&D model is great).  They really weigh nothing and have turned extreme frustration into mild inconvenience a few times for me now. 

Slush on ice approaching Sky Pilot's N. face.

Looking back at the Sweathouse/Bear Ck. divide.  Gash Point is just off image to the right.

 The boot up the N. Face was straightforward, with a bit of punching into voids due to the talus slope and very shallow snowpack.  Sky Pilot sees a lot of wind, and the face was in poor condition.  While we were there, winds were around 30mph sustained with gusts to 50mph.  It was interesting watching sastrugi form, but also a little unpleasant.   
 

Casey sky piloting.

Just above the choke of the North Face, managing some weird sastrugi conditions.

Skiing down the face was fine, if a little bumpy, and the choke was fun.  The lower part of the face that had experienced less wind was fine, and we enjoyed a high speed burn back down to Bear Lake, dodging some crevasse-like glide cracks that had opened on the slabs of smooth granite above it.

The 2300' skin back up to Gash Point was like sitting inside a snowy, slippery oven.  We managed to do it in just over an hour.

As a bonus, we decided to take advantage of the stable conditions, and ski the short couloir that drops from the ridgeline into North Bowl.  I've been wanting to ski this line for years, but hadn't gotten around to it.  We booted the 150' chute Junior High style, snowboards assembled and used as pseudo-ice axes.  The ski down was steep and chalky.  Including this line greatly increases the satisfaction of skiing North Bowl, and comes highly recommended.  Watch out for the man-eating void at the top.  

Looking down the obvious couloir above North Bowl.  Does anyone know if this fine fellow has a name?

After a rocky and slushy egress from Gash Lake back to the Gash Point ramp, we skied the burn nearly to the upper trailhead until things got too thin.  A bit of walking, a bit more riding, and more walking got us back to the truck just after 3, for a round trip of around 8:30, with 8900' of climbing (calculated via topo) and around 15 miles.
 
      

Fall and Winter recap, and a return to posting.

I haven't posted a blog entry in three months, not because of a lack of content, but because of a lack of motivation, and as I sit here typing this, I realize that trying to recap in narrative form would very likely be tedious and unfocused.  To that end, I'm just going to post some (captioned) pictures in rough chronological order of some fall and early winter hijinks. 

Actually, reviewing my collection here, it looks like it's just going to be early winter on the picture front.  During fall, I mucked around in the brush looking for deer, worked too much, and went on some good (if not objectively successful) runs with Brian in the Missions. 

Scrambling up the tricky headwall between North and South Glacier Peaks in the Missions.  We had intended to make a go at traversing from here to East St. Mary's, but the deep and hard packed snow, and lack of adequate mountaineering equipment deterred us.  I also admit that the exposure had me a little bit nervous.

First ski of the year, up Gash Point.  As always with these early season journeys, the low elevation log vaulting was frustrating.  Also, we set off an avalanche of non-negligible size. 

Shenanigans atop Brundage near McCall, ID, where Molly and I spent Christmas with family.  Over the week we went skiing so many times, drove a snowmobile for the first time (to Burgdorf!), shot skeet in a neighborhood, all while enjoying tremendous views of the Lick Creek Range. 

While in McCall, Louie and I enjoyed a skin up the locally prominent Jughandle Mountain, where we enjoyed some of the most magical glade skiing I've had the privilege of shredding.  It was sort of deep for Louie though, because he has short legs.  He still enjoyed the powder and sunshine.

On New Year's, Austin and I skinned to Point Six in some eerie clouds, before dropping a few laps down Jenny Bowl.  I am now in love with the Snowbowl backcountry, and especially these machine groomed skin tracks that they set with their tractors. 

Annual Molly's birthday cabin trip, this time to Zip's cabin on the south border of Glacier National Park, in the Flathead Range, more or less.  Big country, dense trees, great snow, good weather.  Mickey and I happened upon a moose, but it wasn't big enough to try and kill us. 

Looking towards the southern border of the GNP from an unnamed peak on the south side of US-2 near Zip's cabin.  I got a new camera, and it does panoramas.

Early mornings atop Point Six with clear skies always put ideas in the head.  1h15m to the Death Star by the way.  I'm hoping to hit an hour by the end of the season, but that might be a tall order on the splitboard. 

Harscheisen!   Le Couteaux!  The only reason we had a good day on that albedonous Mission sastrugi.  E. St. Mary's lifetime summit number five in fine style and 8800' for the day.  Also, despite expectations, my IT band (which has been a source of major consternation for the last month) did not explode on the icy descending bootpack (or is it just called a hike?)  

 Shadows on the No Fish Lake basin.  My favorite backcountry green circle.

Louie was attacked by a sled dog yesterday.  It pretty much toothed him drive-by style at 15mph.  The musher was legitimate with us though, and is splitting the veterinary costs of getting this handsome fellow (ladies, he's single) stitched up.  And how big a baller is he?  He still ran five miles back to the truck without complaining.

Looking forward to more days pirating Snowbowl's access road, hut trips in the Bearteeth, Sawteeth, and Swanteeth, and Louie's leg fur returning. 

McLeod in a day (fail!).

Despite lingering Achilles tendonitis in both legs that sprung up after the Rut, I did my best to participate in an active recovery, including some slow runs on the Sentinel fire road, as well as a time trial on the Sentinel hill climb with Brian Story.  Trying to keep up with Brian (and failing) led me to a new PR on that section in 25:10, despite the fact that my Achilles were notably upset with me.

With the forecast heading south for this week, I wanted to get in a solid effort on Saturday.  My legs were feeling okay, so I opted for an attempt on the highest mountain in the Rattlesnakes, McLeod Peak (8620'), via the second highest (named) mountain, Murphy Peak (8167'), and Point Six.

I started from the Snowbowl base at 7:00, and started running up the gated access road.  Immediately, I was hit with some Achilles pain, but they didn't seem to be stiffening up or getting worse, so I just walked the steeps and tried to not worry about it.  I made it to the top of Point Six in 1h08m at a relaxed pace.  I've never climbed Snowbowl before (except the skin track during winter once), so I didn't know any of the myriad routes that would have been faster and better than this one.  Retrospectively, I should have just hiked up Paradise to N. Dakota Downhill or directly under Grizzly Chair.  I never realized that the Death Star was so goddam huge.  What do they keep in there?

The ridge run to Murphy went fast, and I got some great views of the snow-dusted Missions.  I am once again amazed at how much more snow they get than anywhere else.

Beyond Murphy, the ridge started to get spicy.  Eventually, I had to downclimb some loose class 3 to get around some gendarmes on the ridge.  This was some pretty chossy and sharp shale type junk, and the scree was too thin to ski, and the holds were all negative, so the going was sort of slow.  I hit a small col above Finley Lakes here, and then had to climb at the 4th class level some pretty solid pink quartzite to regain the ridge.  The climbing here was fun and rather exposed, but slow once again.  Things mellowed out here, and a few miles of straightforward ridge running and sidehilling finally brought me to the crux of the route, and the section that turned me back, two unnamed high points that look rather like bunny ears when viewed from Mosquito Peak.  The western ear is easily surmountable, with a nice talus gully leading up and over.  The ridge between the two was also plausible though exposed.  The eastern ear was highly exposed, wet (snowy on the N. sides!), and looked to be upper 4th, perhaps 5th class on loose rock, and more than I wanted to deal with solo and so far in the backcountry. 

I made a tentative effort to downclimb into the basin to the S., but ended up getting cliffed out.  4h30m into the day, with weather looking like it might deteriorate and plenty of scrambling left to do, I opted to turn around.  The scrambling on the way back went slowly again, and routefinding through the 4th class bit was trickier than going the other way.  I ended up back at Point Six at the 7h30m mark, and I took the Beargrass Highway back down, which is tremendously fun and fast running, and made it back to the truck around the 8 hour mark. 

I'm going to have to successfully summit now.  I've got a strong idea how to do it more easily now, mainly by bypassing most of the trickiness.  The ridge run is elegant and fun, but also slow, and the traverse to Sanders Lake across upper Grant Creek, despite the lack of trail, seems like it would be straightforward (I know it is during the winter).  From Sanders, I intend to contour around the ridge that extends south from the west rabbit ear, and from there, it's a simple matter to regain the ridge and climb it to McLeod.  Now just waiting for the weather window and the time.  Total distance for the day was 19 miles with 8000' vertical.  The complete route would be more like 23 miles with 10000'.

Snowy Missions from Murphy Peak.

The East Rabbit ear from the west, looking difficult.

Klapperslange Tungen.

The way home.

 

The Rut 50k

On Saturday, I ran the Rut 50k in 6:05:43, which was enough for 8th place.  I had a really good time on this beautiful and difficult course, and I learned a great deal about how to train to do better next time and what some of my stronger and weaker skill sets are.  This being my first race ever (not just ultras; this was the first footrace of my life), I couldn't (reasonably) be any happier.  It happened like this.

Molly and I, having camped up Swan Creek, a big trib of the Gallatin, woke up at 4:45 to a solid drizzle, and I made a quick breakfast of 4 slices of bacon, some delicious Quebecois full strength yogurt (Liberte Brand), and a healthy scoop of nut butter.  We made the short drive up to the Big Sky base area, and picked up a bag of decent quality schweg as well as my race number, which was 23.  We sat around in the nice lodge, and I drank too much tea.  Mike the RD announced that lightning considerations were sufficiently tolerable to keep the climb up to Lone Peak as part of the course (there had been some doubt in the previous days.

Two minutes before the race start, people were still milling around, with a few people tentatively drifting towards the inflatable starting arch.  I felt presumptuous for doing it, but there was nobody really lined up at the front yet, so that's where I positioned myself (I gather that the front is usually where people who think they're going to win stand).  When the race started, I got excited and went out with the front runners, Pocatello's Luke Nelson setting the pace.  I even managed to stay with them for most of the first 1400' climb, but then I got dropped when we topped out on a flat road.  This section was pretty short, and then the race dropped down some steepish, pretty rocky single track that was a blast.  I made up a bit of time here, getting some of the leaders in view again, but they dropped me again when the course flattened out onto a vaguely downhill access road threading through some Moonlight Basin vacation properties. 

I was in eight-ish around this point and I didn't see anyone else for another six miles, well after the first aid station (which I didn't stop at because I had plenty of food and water).  Sometime around Mile 11, the eventual winner, Paul Hamilton, caught up with me and loped past effortlessly.  At the time, I thought that I had slowed down, but it turns out that he was just moving really fast.  I managed to maintain my position all the way to the next aid station, even passing someone on a short stretch of rocky downhill, although Brian Story and two others were creeping up on me and we ended up all reaching the Lone Peak tram dock around the same time.

I again made up a bunch of time running back downhill to the base of Bonecrusher ridge.  I had recognized at this point that I was generally slower on the flats and climbs than my pursuers, but notably faster on the descents.  I decided that leveraging this on the descent off of Lone Peak was probably wiser than blowing up trying to move too quickly to the summit, and maintained a pretty relaxed hiking pace to the top.  I was feeling it in my legs from the long, moderate switchbacking climb up to the tram dock, and in my lungs from the altitude (I never do any sustained running above 9000' while training in Missoula).  I got passed three times on the 2100' ascent to Lone Peak, but I made it to the summit within a minute of all of those that had passed me.  By the way, the ascent of Bonecrusher ridge must be one of the gnarlier sections of trail to be found in an American trail race, not that I have a basis for comparison.  It hits 40+ degrees towards the summit, with loose rock and good exposure off the right-hand side.  The wind was blowing, and the cloud deck made me feel like I was mountain climbing rather than racing. 

At the summit aid station, I learned that I was 30 minutes or so behind the front of the pack.  Obviously no chance of making that up with 12 miles to go, but it felt nice to hear that we weren't getting completely smoked.  I drank some Coca-Cola and started down the rocky, technical southeast ridge.  I consciously pushed hard down the ridge, taking some risks on the loose and wet rock (interesting geology through this section by the way).  I passed four people during the descent, and got a bunch of rocks in my shoes from scree-skiing down a little gully.  By the time I hit some flatter terrain towards the bottom, I had put at least 2 or 3 minutes on my nearest pursuer, time that I knew I would need to maintain my position if patterns from earlier in the day held. 

I reached the base of some lift (Swiftcurrent?) and a guy there told me that it was mostly jeep tracks to the finish.  This was not strictly true, but there were jeep tracks for a while.  I kept catching glimpses of Jeff Rome in front of me (and would for the remainder of the race), but was never able to make up any time on him.  Not much happened for the next five miles.  Some moderately ascending  roads gave way to some moderately descending single-track.  The ascent of Andesite Mountain to the last aid station was easy and fast, with the exception of the ascent of the Africa mountain bike trail, which included sections of clawing up near vertical mud walls.  I don't know how a person rides down it.  Someone had almost caught up with me before this bit, but I managed to put up a bit more of a lead through here and hit the final aid station with a reasonably comfortable pad.  The volunteers at all of the aid stations were wonderful, but these ones had been so nice as to learn my name, which was a surprising boost (to my ego, I guess).  Thanks guys.

I nearly sprinted out of the aid before realizing that doing so was laughably non-sustainable at that point, even on a downhill grade.  I still tried to push the steep single track as much as my legs would allow, but these last five miles were the least interesting of the race and I just tried to keep from slowing down.  I powerhiked a final climb, ran some rollers, and then had a mellow descent to the finish, where Molly and Louie were waiting.  I had suspected that I was in eighth for a while, but this was confirmed at the finish.

A few thoughts (about improving my own performance, probably not of much interest to anyone else):
1.  My training, especially the last month, wasn't really done properly.  I've been spending a great deal of time powerwalking ascents or hauling ass down technical stuff.  Both of these things helped (especially the technical descending), but most of the race was still just trail running.  I'm a relatively slow runner, and I don't climb (while running) all that well.  I need to do more straight trail running (and flatland speed training) to be competitive in these kinds of events.

2.  Cross-training is something I need to do, especially cycling.  I need more sustained time at VO2max.

3.  I was forced into a pretty long (2 week) rest period by various obligations before this race.  I called it a taper.  This was way too long, and I got stiff during that time.  This may or may not have hurt my performance, but is definitely increasing my recovery time.  Four or five days of tapering will probably be sufficient.

4.  Also on recovery, I had been a little lax in allowing grains back into my theretofore mostly grain free diet.  Again, may or may not have been detrimental to race performance, but almost certainly increasing recovery time.  Eating fewer gels is also appealing. 

5.  No caffeine within an hour of starting.

   


  
      

This was my final week before beginning to taper for the Rut.  I covered 67 miles and logged 25200' of climbing, much of which was high quality training (either high intensity, in difficult terrain, and/or in 90 degree heat.  Or I was hiking in a fairly relaxed way).  Really felt like I got something out of this set of runs, and I'm feeling very prepared (and stoked!) for the race. 

About that race...  I digitized the course for the Rut in Google Earth, essentially by tracing the existing Google Maps route that exists on its website, and extracted the elevation profile.  The distance is pretty close to the reported 50k.  The vertical reported by Google Earth, however, is just shy of 12000'.  Note that this is almost 4000' more than is reported.  I think that Google Earth elevation profiles often inflate vertical gain due to high-frequency trail undulations and errors in the GE DEM.  To counter this, I just measured from obvious low points to obvious high points and summed all of the climbs that had a vertical above 500' or so.  I got more or less the same result.  I can't say that I really mind.  I like vertical, and my training has tended towards more vertical and lower miles, because that's the kind of terrain that I find compelling.  I just hope that nobody gets sandbagged by an extra 50% of climbing (and descending) on top of an already significant figure. 

I'm also looking forward to a trip down the Main Salmon this coming weekend, with Molly, Louie, many friends, and (significantly) my brother, who's flying in from the East for his first river trip through the Idaho wilderness.   


08.26.13 Sentinel Hill Climb, 3mi, 2000', 41min:
25:30 up (PR), few minutes on top, about 13:00 down.  Done at around 1PM

08.27.13 Sentinel Hill Climb + University, 8mi, 3700', 1h30m:
26:45 up, then tagged the summit if University Mountain at 54:low.  Done at 4PM.

08.28.13 Sentinel Hill Climb + University, 14mi, 4800', 2h10m:
27 up, but then a much faster trip over to University, hitting the summit at 51:03 before running over to the South Side trails and running the fun singletrack of the Sam Braxton trail.  Started at 4:30.

08.29.13 Sentinel S + N, 6 mi, 1900', 52m:
Short evening run with Louie.  Finally cool enough for him to hang outside the early morning hours.

08.31.13 Williams Range Peaks, 9800' (+400'), 25mi (+3mi), 7h30m (+1h):
Finally managed to visit the rugged Williams Range, in the heart of the (proposed) Great Burn Wilderness.  Access for me was 12 miles off the northwest side of Lolo Pass.  I've been wanting to visit this region for a while, having seen its craggy peaks from both the south and north, as well as fished Cayuse Creek, Kelly Creek, Crooked Fork, and the Lochsa, which all have their origins in this knot of not especially high, but remarkably pristine and beautiful peaks in a corner of Idaho that sees very little traffic. 

I left the truck at 7:30, running through an open old Lodgepole grove that shared a glacial valley with the upper Crooked Fork.  After a few miles, the trail started climbing steeply up the east wall of the valley, and I quickly reached a saddle below Granite Peak (7551'), my first objective for the day.  This saddle was also the end of regular trail maintenance.  Granite Peak is about 2500' and 4 miles from the trailhead, and I reached its summit about an hour.  Climbing the solid rock pinnacles that give the peak its name was great fun and afforded excellent views of the route for the day, which would include both Shale Mountain (7612') to the north, and Rhodes Peak (7930', highest of the range) to the west. 

I followed the ridge from Granite to an unnamed high point, with intermittent aid from a very old and very underutilized horse track, and from there headed north to Shale, losing and regaining a lot of elevation in the process.  The ridgelines were mostly bare, due to the fire that sterilized the soil in 1910, and from which the vegetation has not yet recovered.  The lack of vegetation also allowed a great deal of erosion to occur, and the ridges were sometimes composed of almost beach-like sand, and sometimes of bunchgrasses.  Hoodoos of resistant granite protruded haphazardly, but didn't present the same kind of obstacles that ridgetop outcrops do in the Bitterroot Mountains.  I was back to the highpoint connecting Shale and Rhodes just before the 4 hour mark, and made a conscious effort to push hard to Rhodes, finding a decent section of trail for a little ways.  The trail once again petered out though, and I ended up taking a fairly inefficient to the south ridge of Rhodes, and from there the summit.  Below Rhodes, I found the only (only!) water of the day (except at the very beginning), a little spring of tepid water in the hanging valley east of Rhodes Peak.  It was low quality water, but a joy nonetheless, having been dry for almost two hours.  Now that I knew the routes, I ran the 10 or so miles back to Granite Peak relatively quickly, and from there, the descent down the open pine forests and good trail was a gas.

I reached the truck in good spirits (from eating enough sugar during the day) and time to spare to reach Lolo Pass, where I was to meet Molly to go camping.  We ended up visiting the Elk Summit area, taking a good hike that evening out to an overlook from which views of the West Fork of Moose Creek and its mountains were visible.      


09.01.13 Friday Pass, 2600', 8mi, 5h:
Great hike from the Kooskooskia Meadows trailhead, near Elk Summit.  Pretty lakes (but no fish), and awesome views of the Roots and Graves Peak.  

Granite Peak summit.

Hoodoo with Rhodes Peak.

Shale Mountain summit.

Rhodes Peak summit view, with Ranger Peak in the distance.

Ain't nothing says America like a Mule hitched to a flagpole.

A pleasingly symmetric Graves Peak.

Making waves in Swamp Lake.

Getting esoteric.

Two aggregately moderate, but high intensity weeks of 74 miles with 18900' of gain, and 79 miles with 21100' of gain. 

08.13.13 Lolo Peak from Mill Creek Trhd., 19mi, 6500', 3h34m11s:
I've found that I spend too much time driving up the Mormon Peak road when I go to Lolo peak, and that doing this is really just short-changing my training efforts.  The alternative is to start at the Mill Creek trailhead, which is on the Lolo Creek valley bottom, at around 3600' (as opposed to the standard trailhead at 5800').  This adds an additional 2200' of runnable vertical, and about 5 miles to the trip.  It also allows for a descent of the Mill Creek trail, which is one of the Missoula area's better mountain bike trails (so I hear), and is just as fun on foot.  I decided to make this into a loop, ascending Lantern Ridge, which ascends Lolo Peak's west side, and descended the standard Carlton Ridge to Mill Creek Trail route.  I pushed hard both up and down, and was really happy to have solidly broken the 4 hour mark, despite off trail travel on Lantern Ridge.  In fact, my time from the much lower trailhead was not much slower than my times on the standard route.  Regrettably, running fast on the descent put a big strain on my calves in the way that I'm not used to, and definitely left me hurting for the next few days.
 
08.14.13 Gully Loop, 4mi, 900', 50m:
So slowww.

08.15.13 Double Dip + Etc., 14mi, 4900', 2h15m (injury):
I ran the Double Dip course but with the addition of a second summit of Sentinel after running to the M, and a descent down the Pengelly trail.  About the time I started descending from the south summit, my calf started screaming, and I walked the rest of the way home.   

08.17.13 Rattlesnake Corridor Loop, 31mi, 5100', 4h55m:
After a day off, my calf seemed alright, and I decided to give this long run an attempt.  The route ascends to Stuart Peak from the main Rattlesnake trailhead, then drops down the backside into Lake Creek, before intersecting with the Corridor road for a 15 or 16 mile slog out on the rocky old dirt road.  Everything until the corridor was lovely (although I took the descent down the Lake Creek trail easy to avoid reinjuring my leg way the hell in the backcountry).  Running the entire corridor is an exercise in boredom, and I doubt I will ever do this again.

08.18.13 Fishin' up Colt Killed!, 6mi, 500', All Damn Day:
Some good, solid dog-wrangling, cutthroat harrasing fly fishing on the west side of the Bitterroots.  I count these recovery hikes as training, just try and stop me.

08.20.13 Straight Peak, 22mi, 5600', 4h49m:
I've been wanting to do this loop in the Great Burn for some time,  but the logistics and inclination never worked out before today.  The route begins at the Clearwater Crossing trailhead at the end of the W. Fork Fish Creek road.  I ended up ascending the lovely W. Fork Fish Creek trail before cutting off on the endless switchbacks that lead up to Cedar Mountain and the ridge separating West Fish from Straight Creek.  I was skeptical of the quality of this trail, but it turns out that it has been really well maintained.  From here, the run up the ridge to Straight Peak is straightforward (although I heard a cougar screaming nearby and that was spooky).  The top of Straight Peak is lovely, with views south to the Williams Range, and the imposing South Face of Crater Mountain dominating the view to the north.  What a slab of uninterrupted rock that is.  I look forward to skiing it at some point.  The descent to Chilcoot Pass from Straight Peak was a little confusing, with the trail becoming rather indistinct.  It's not really a problem because the ridge is perfect for overland travel, I just kept second guessing myself about finding the Straight Creek trail.  The egress out Straight Creek is rather long, rocky, and really brushy, and the trail is engineered in a strange way where it slithers back and forth over the broad valley bottom for no identifiable reason.  It crosses the creek six times, and most of these require wet shoes.  The brush was pretty bad for much of the time, which always makes me grumpy, and by the time I got back to the truck, my scratched legs and soggy feet had my feeling an uncharacteristic degree of animosity towards Straight Creek, despite the fact that this route should not be that strenuous. 

08.21.13 Gully Loop, 4mi, 900', no time:

08.22.13 AM University Mountain, 8mi, 2600', 1h10m:  
It's finally cooled off enough to bring the dog in the morning, and he is pretty stoked.  He's also relatively out of shape and was tired at the end of this one.  But he wasn't too hot. 

08.22.13 PM Sentinel Hill Climb, 5mi, 2000', 45m:
Sentinel Hill Climb in 25m31s, by best time thus far (but still poor, from a competitive perspective).  I keep thinking I should use poles, but is that cheating!?

08.24.13 Anaconda Hi-Line Loop, 35mi, 8000', 7h01m:
This was a beautiful and naturally constructed long loop in the Anaconda Range at the headwaters of the iconic rock creek.  The route essentially circumnavigates Warren Peak, crossing five passes of varying magnitudes (and the continental divide twice!).  Despite the long drive from Missoula, I strongly recommend this one.  I ran the loop clockwise in order to give myself bail options in the event of (forecasted) thunderstorms.

I left Missoula at 4:30, and arrived at the Carpp Creek Trailhead around 7:15.  I left the truck at 7:30, and immediately took a wrong turn and had to bushwhack around the creek bottom until finding the trail leading up towards Maloney Basin and Cutaway pass.  The trails in the Anaconda-Pintlers are really well maintained (although sometimes technical) and I had a pleasant time making the initial 2500' climb to 9600' Cutaway Pass along well groomed, low-angle switchbacks.  Some of the switchbacks even had tent pads built right in, in case you get tired, or just wanted to spend some time looking at the Teton-esque Warren Peak.  That's how nice the AP trail crews are.  The highpoint (and highlight) of the route (actually well above the named Cutaway Pass) was well above treeline, and the trail was just a trough dug out of the talus, which was fun to try to move efficiently over in minimal shoes.  The descent into LaMerche Creek was really pleasant, the perfect angle for high velocity cruising.  I followed the creek up to Warren Lake and from there up to the second pass of the day.  The trail down from here into Fishtrap Creek was technical, rooty, and fun, losing alot of elevation quickly that is then gradually regained with the long and rolling forested ascent towards Rainbow Pass.  The views to the Pintler Peaks from Rainbow pass are grand, with craggy peaks and lakes in all directions.  The descent to Johnston Lake and the run around the west side of the Warren massif are unremarkable; I lost some energy running through burns and the seemingly endless uphill slog towards Porter Ridge, although the extensive talus moonscapes were interesting.  From Porter Ridge, I dropped into the Tamarack Creek basin, which is full of sinuous, technical tread and granite erratics.  I was sort of going through a dark patch through this stretch; it would be a blast to run while feeling good.  A climb over a ridge leads into the Carpp Lakes basin, which is very likely the most popular location in the Anacondas.  A logical extension from here would be to ascend to Warren Pass and descend the Maloney Basin back to the trailhead.  I considered it but decided that between building thunderheads and friends to see back in town, that it should wait until next time.  The trail from Carpp Lake back to the Carpp Creek trailhead was relatively buff, and I was happy to find that I still had sufficient energy to run this stretch fast.  I want to go back and climb all the peaks and fish all the lakes.

08.25.13 Kid Lake Huckleberry Picking and Wood Gathering, 5mi, 1000', Even longer:
Molly, Louie, and I went to our favorite huckleberry spot and loaded up, and did a little bit of unproductive fishing.  We also started our fall firewood collection in earnest, cutting about a cord's worth of long rounds (we buck at home), using only axe and crosscut saw, per usual.  A strong and sudden afternoon thunderstorm over the ridge added some excitement as we scrambled to load the wood onto the trailer before getting electrocuted.  Even Louie was giving us concerned looks.

Warren Peak from one of the convenient rest stops on the ascent to Cutaway Pass.

Warren's unnamed twin above Warren Lake.

Anaconda Moonscape.

Louie being all uncertain about his Wolf Pack.  He won't tell you about it, but he's calculating his loss of aerodynamicy and increased surface area, and how that will affect his chipmunk hunting efficiency.

   

 

Narrowly avoiding big round numbers.

Managed a few enjoyable long runs in three different ranges this past week, as well as some shorter high-intensity outings close to home.  Total mileage for the week was 97 miles with 29800' of gain.  Done in around 19h30m. 

08.05.13 Sentinel Hill Climb + Etc. 12mi, 3300', 1h45m:
Did the M to Ridge Trail to the summit in just under 27 minutes, which is respectable, but not particularly fast.  I did this at around 5PM and definitely felt the heat.  Then some cruising around some of the less frequented trails of the Sentinel massif.

08.06.13 Mosquito Peak via Stuart Peak, 26mi, 7000', 4h15m:
Tagged the Summit of Mosquito, bypassing Stuart Peak on the way out, tagging its summit on the way back.  This was my first trip up Mosquito during the summer and with good visibility, and the views are really remarkable, with many of the Rattlesnake basin lakes visible.  The massive McCleod Peak dominates the viewshed, and I'm again inspired to try and reach the top of it, which there is no really easy way to do.  The trail is fast and flowing, and the descent from Stuart always goes faster than I expect it should.  I took some superfluous detours off trail before reaching Mosquito; I think that this will go under 4 hours next time. 

08.07.13 Fire Road Intervals, 6mi, 40m:
Standard stuff.

08.08.13 Lolo Peak, 14mi, 4900', 2h51m:
Up and down as quickly as possible (for me).  Splits:
0:51 Vista Point
1:31 North Summit
1:39 South Summit
1:47 North Summit
2:20 Vista Point
What this tells me is that I need to learn how to go much faster downhill.  The last mile before the trailhead, I started hitting the pace that I wanted, probably somewhere between 5 and 6 minutes.  Now I just need to do that all the time.

08.09.13 Sentinel Hill Climb + Etc., 10mi, 2500', 1h30m:
Slow hill climb (29m) and some pretty relaxed jogging around the mountain. 

08.10.13 Mineral Hill + Pt. 8098 + Echo Peak + Iron Mountain + Daly Peak, 25mi, 10100', 7h55m:
Long tour in the Scapegoat, making a loop above Kleinschmidt flats and hitting most of the major summits between the East Fork of the North Fork and the Big Blackfoot.  The bypass trail around the east side of Cooper's Lake is weird and unintuitive and took a long time.  Windy Pass is cool, and the views from Mineral Hill are worth the difficulty of getting there.  Everything between Windy Pass until after Daly Peak was overland, with a significant amount of Krumholz-whacking, as well as a little bit of 3rd class, particularly dropping from Daly into Dry Creek.  A significant portion of the terrain was not runnable, and I felt like I hiked half the day.  Despite the length and relatively stout vertical, I felt really good at the end of this one.

08.11.13 Gully Loop, 4mi, 1000', 36m:
I had big aspirations to do an additional long run this day, but friends from California were in town, and we decided to boat the Alberton Gorge instead.  Still managed a small run in the evening, but not quite enough for either 100 miles for the week, or 30k vertical. 

Snowbowl backcountry from Mosquito Peak.

Mineral Hill from the east.

Mineral Hill (Center) and Echo Mountain (Left) from Daly Peak.

Big McCleod and the upper Rattlesnake.