Return to Mt Greylock

Seems like Mount Greylock has a certain allure to Bimblers that keeps us going back for repeat visits. While this tale can not compare in challenge with the winter visits by others in our merry band, the Mount Greylock half marathon is still a worthy challenge for any trail runner.

I had run this race once before and thought it would be a good race for Shelly Girl to take on, as well as good training for the Escarpment next month.. We left bright and early and arrived at Greylock Glen about an hour before the 10 a.m. start time. It was a beautiful day to run with cool tempertures and blue sunny skies. The organizers had a little trouble getting everybody registered, and this delayed the start, but shortly after 10:00 we took off across the field scrambling for first entrance on to the single track that starts about 100 yards from the beginning.

Greylock is a very challenging race for several reasons. The first is the race starts with a three plus mile, 2,700 feet, ascent to the top of the mountain. The climb is somewhat similar to the first climb to Windham Peak at Escarpment so I had decided to try and run a lot of the trail to see how that would work out. Of course, the danger in this strategy is using too much effort to soon and bonking later on. I figured what the hell, I walked the final 10k at Pineland Farms last year so I went for it. There were still many parts that I had to hike but I have never run this much up a mountain before and I believe I learned a lot from the experience.

After the climb, there is a brief but wonderful run across the top of the hill. It was a beautiful day and the views were awesome. I was also thinking about the last time I was there, on a great fall hike with my girlfirend, and I smiled thinking about her rocking the ascent. I even looked behind half expecting her to be there! 🙂

I skipped the first aid station and hooked up with a guy I will call “long John” to begin the rocking descent off of the mountain. I pride myself on being pretty bold getting down a hill but today I not only met my equal but I met by better. Man he could fly! I call him long John because he was so tall and he had no fear, leaping long distances with each step. The descent off of Greylock is not for the faint of heart and this guy had lots of heart. I stayed with him as long as I could but I simply could not hang and decided to tuck in my pace, in order to not completely shred my legs. The downhill scramble continues for quite a while, before flattening out on to rolling technical single track. I did not remember this section from the previous time but I was actually glad to run some extensive trail similar to the vast majority of the Escarpment rolling sections.

After slugging my way through this section I entered one of my favorite parts of the race. This is a wonderful open field section of single track with easy trails and spectacular 360 views. I am guessing Suds can let us know what this section is called but, for now, I am going to call it the “place of peace”. I just felt wonderful! As we all know, there are certain places, on certain courses, that just make you smile and say “man I am one lucky guy”. The place of peace was that for me today.

Shortly after leaving this section I arrived at the place of hell. It really was not bad but leaving those wonderful fields to be dumped out on an uphill road section is just brutal on the spirit.

After the place of hell, there was another section of rolling single track before beginning the next signature section of Greylock. I am guessing this section is 2 or 3 miles and it is one of those sections were you should be flying as fast as you are able. The problem is you are more interested in not enduring any more pain or exerting any more effort. I struggled on this section previously so I was determined to run strong and run everything. The trail itself is a fire road, at mainly a downhill grade, that makes running fast easy but the trail itself is all beat up and it is very difficult to find good footing. There is also one pretty long section of what I like to call subtle uphill. The kind of hill that, based on the grade, you should run but goes on and on making you feel like you are working very hard. I did end up hiking several times but overall was pretty pleased with my progress through this part of the race. Sooner that I expected I began the last section of trail which is just “fly robin fly”. Easy, open, downhill trail that is just a lot of fun. I was passing lots of runners so I was secretly hoping to see my friend “long John” but I kind of figured he was not a fader and was probably already in the car driving home (probably with the drivers seat all the way back to allow for leg room!). Oh yeah, one last thing about long John. I am almost positive he is a pushing 60’s runner. He was awesome! Soon enough, I came out of the woods, raced across the field from which I started and finished.

After the race, I ate not 1, not 2 but 3 hot dogs, talked with a girl who I had been running with most of the day and waited for Shelly Girl to finish.. A few minutes later she came racing in, looking awesome as usual. She finished second in her age group, but felt great about her virgin attempt at Greylock and learned a lot about how to shave some time off next time around.

I love this race, it is challenging but that only makes completing the course that much more sweet. Plus, there is a ton of downhill, which is always fun! Hope you all will keep this race in mind for next year.

 

See ya on the trails,

Lefty

For more pictures, click here.