Week Ending 12-29-24

My knee has been miserable for nearly 6 weeks and my hip (favoring?) is also now awful.  I broke down and went back to my doctor.  MRI next week and diagnosis by 01/03.  Seems like a bunch of stuff all at once for me.  Both of my deltoid muscles became very sore 2 weeks ago and haven’t improved.  I’m hoping it is just as simple as my keyboard is not positioned correctly.  Right now I’m having trouble lifting things and raising my hands over my head is impossible.  Piling on, my ganglion cyst has also grown and is causing issues in my right foot (booked an appointment for that as well).  Finally (I hope), my arthritis in my thumb has ramped up and I can’t even hold a razor with that hand now.  Booking that as well.

 

I kept the ball rolling this week with 86 miles but never felt very good.  There were a few days with snow and icy footing and that sure doesn’t help.  Eric Morse stopped down this way and we got in a run on the Methuen & Salem rail trail after seeing the Wasabi Bowl at Fenway Park.

 

Onward!

 

Week – 86

Month – 353

Year – 4,017

Life 162,748

A "new" rail trail

I like running on Rail Trails, must be the flat terrain and lack of traffic.  In 2024 I ran over 1,600 miles on the Methuen Rail Trail including over 500 times from the Methuen Depot to the NH state line.  Of course, I enjoy heading off on other rail trails and especially enjoy finding new trails.  Last month I ran with Jim Pawlicki on the Danvers RT and we checked out the little section that branches off to the west.  It was nice but only 6/10ths of a mile.  Joe Shairs mentioned that he’d done a short run on the Middleton RT (which will eventually connect to that 6/10ths section) and that got me wondering how much of the trail was completed.  I did some research on the web page (middletonrailtrail.org) and checked out Google maps and from what I gathered I’d be able to park in North Andover and go to Danvers. One thing lacking on the website was a map with the parking shown, they are separate and if you don’t know the specific locations it is hard to figure out where parking is.  I hope they add parking to the map or add trail distances to the parking descriptions, both would be helpful in planning.  This seemed like a good adventure for December 24 which the President granted as an additional Holiday for Federal workers.  Description of the trail follows, but it is very easy to follow since rail trails tend to be straight! 

 

I parked at 361 Sharpners Pond road in North Andover where you can safely park at least four cars on the side of the road.  There is a small sign for the rail trail.  I was surprised by the steep little downhill from the road to a small foot bridge.  My first thought was “this is going to be a trail with lots of up/down”.  I was wrong.  This was the only hill of any kind on the entire route, and the only part of the trail that is in North Andover (.02 miles).  There was a dusting of snow on the ground and there would be snow showers throughout my run. At 1.46 miles cross Leitner road (private road). Note that there is signage here about it being private and the placement of the signs implies that the trail itself is private (it is NOT).  Ignore the signs and continue on. At 1.61 miles the trail ends at the junction of Essex Street (route 62) and Old Essex Street.  Turn left on Old Essex (which is one way and you will be going against traffic). At 1.87 miles you will rejoin Essex street.  Use caution crossing and at 1.89 miles at the junction of Essex and Dixey Drive the trail continues. At 2.29 cross Essex street again. At this point the trail become wider and is a packed dirt surface for the remainder.  At exactly 3.0 miles reach the road behind Howe Manning School.  There is parking available here for 28 cars (45 Central Street, Middleton MA).  At 3.6 miles cross Essex street again. At 3.84 miles the trail ends at Oak street, turn left on Oak and right on Essex (route 62) to cross over the Ipswich River.  There is parking at the boat launch on route 62 right before you cross over the river, maybe four cars could park here.  At 3.94 miles take a right on Perkins and return to the trail.  There is parking for about 10 cars available across the street at 210 Maple Street, Middleton. At 4.15 miles cross Gregory Street, there is some on-street parking available near the intersection of Gregory, East and Maple (route 62).  At 4.52 miles reach the (marked) Danvers town line.  The trail continues in Danvers for another .85 ending at 5.37 miles at the access road for Hathorne.  The map below shows my route with arrows pointing to the parking.  You can also pull up the GPX of the route here:

https://www.mapmyrun.com/routes/view/6368112547/

It was a long slow run for me with the snow in Middleton at about 4 inches deep and mostly unpacked.  There had only been a little traffic on the trail, although I did see some snowshoe prints.  I only saw 4 people in the nearly 2 hours I was out there.  I really enjoyed the run after turning and heading back despite the snow getting a bit heavier.  I ended up adding another 1.2 miles on the road at the end to get a 12 mile run which was only the 6th time I’ve run longer than 10 miles in 2024.

Perry's Birthday race 4m

Next up was Perry’s Birthday Race which I’ve done a few times, although most recently I’d run it WITH Perry and the year before that I WALKED the course.  Perry Seagrove is the NHTI XC coach and I’ve run with him on the occasional Sunday Concord group run.  Perry also puts on the 100 Hats race in March, a mile road race that I have enjoyed doing.  My feeling of sluggishness have been hampering my training (at least the pace, not the distance) and I wasn’t sure I really wanted to give this a go with the way my knee was also talking to me.  I had a very good morning run mid-week and riding the wake of that I decided to give it a shot.  The dusting of snow we got didn’t help my confidence any as I did a 3 mile run early in the day as the race wasn’t until 11.  I drove the course first to see if I even wanted to do a preview for a warm-up.  It was a little snowy, icy, and wet. I had a quick chat with Perry and Tom Raffio while picking up my number and then headed out.  I was incredibly tentative running the course.  It was hard to tell how slick the wet areas were and whether they were black ice.  I randomly bumped into 3 guys at the top of the hill as the exited a side trail.  I ran behind them for ¼ mile and then they bounced onto some other trails.  I was thinking “I’d rather be doing that than racing”.  Never a good sign.  I made it through the warm-up and had some hard choices on what to wear for racing.  It was 22 degrees and the wind was gusting to 30 mph.  Not comfortable at all.

 

About 50 hearty folk lined up and I had to chuckle when the lady leading a prayer wished everyone a “person best”.  This was not a PR course or a PR day.  Dave Audet noted he didn’t see any “fast guys” but I pointed out a young kid I’d seen doing sprints in the parking lot.  Off we went down the icy access road and then a very cautious turn onto the main road.  I didn’t pass Audet until about 200 meters into the main road and by then the kid I’d pointed out was way out in front.  I tried to latch onto the 2^nd place guy, one of the rare runners on this day wearing shorts.  By the time we’d hit the top of the hill (1.3 miles) the leader was 30 seconds ahead and I was just a few steps behind second.  He was a lot less cautious than I was on the downhill and slowly pulled away.  By 2 miles the leader was 30 seconds up and second was 15 seconds ahead of me.  I thought I worked the tough (and some of the slushy snow roads) climb from 2 – 2.5 and could see the leader was now only 20 seconds ahead, but 2^nd was closing on him.  By the top of the hill (2.7 miles) the leader was caught and by 3 miles the new leader was 30 seconds up and second was “coming back to me”.  I had not looked at my watch during the race, figuring with the terrain and footing I’d probably be very disappointed.  I did look at the first ½ mile of the descent (3:02) and figured I might have a shot at break 6 for the mile and might even be able to catch the early leader.  I closed to a little less than 10 seconds but then he took a look back and kicked it in.  I didn’t break 6 (6:02) for that mile and was surprised at how slowly I had run.  Even for this course it seemed slow at 6:54 pace.  I’ll take solace that I never gave up and pushed throughout.  I’ve now finished in 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd at this race.  After a very brief warm-down I layered up and went out for a chilly 1:15 bike ride.  Great fun!

           

 

12/21/2024         27:33     3^rd of 49.

12/16/2023         39:26     Ran with Perry

12/18/2021         54:50     Walked it with Eric & Murdoch

12/16/2017         23:47     1^st of 57 (511 last mile!) 

12/22/2012         23:09     2^nd of 156          

 

 

 

 

Place     Time     Pace      Name                Gend     Age       Team

1          0:26:50  6:43      Paul Woodbury   M          33        

2          0:27:20  6:50      Jorge Guerra       M          17        

3          0:27:33  6:54      Dave Dunham     M          60         Northeast Delta Dental

4          0:28:48  7:12      David Audet        M          59         North Medford Club

5          0:30:31  7:38      Mitchell Weinberg M          42        

6          0:31:22  7:51      Mike Barry          M          68        

7          0:31:28  7:52      Ryleigh Lorimer   F          29        

8          0:32:55  8:14      Bob Lemaire       M          73        

9          0:33:00  8:15      Cameron Armstrong         M          21        

10         0:33:35  8:24      Michael O'Neill     M          51         Millennium Running

11         0:34:05  8:32      Ellen Raffio         F          56         Delta Dental

12         0:35:41  8:56      Irene Rainville     F          60        

13         0:36:27  9:07      Christopher Clasby           M          62        

14         0:37:24  9:21      Perry Seagroves  M          72        

15         0:37:42  9:26      Stacey Jaros       F          37        

16         0:38:04  9:31      Mary Ellen Harvey F          67        

17         0:38:14  9:34      William Fraser     M          23        

18         0:39:40  9:55      Michael Harvey    M          67        

19         0:39:53  9:59      Judi Lemaire       F          72         NE 65+

20         0:41:41  10:26     Paul Sorenson     M          69         65 Plus Running Club

21         0:41:45  10:27     Robin Soller        F          66        

22         0:41:49  10:28     John Fraser         M          61        

23         0:42:35  10:39     Paul Horvath       M          65        

24         0:42:54  10:44     Marilyn Nylen      F          57        

25         0:42:59  10:45     Bruce Johnstone  M          66         New England 65+

26         0:44:08  11:02     Robin Reed         F          60        

27         0:45:42  11:26     Tom Graham       M          60        

28         0:47:35  11:54     Jonathan Powell   M          75        

29         0:47:37  11:55     Taryn Adams      F          27        

30         0:48:18  12:05     Jean Manning      F          61         GDTC

31         0:48:53  12:14     Susan Lovering    F          72         New England 65+ Running Club

32         0:49:45  12:27     Rita Labella         F          74         NE65+ Running Club

33         0:49:52  12:28     Amy Seagroves   F          37        

34         0:50:35  12:39     Rick Cibotti         M          70        

35         0:50:46  12:42     Corrie Woodbury F          34        

36         0:51:58  13:00     Colleen Connolly  F          63         North Medford Club

37         0:52:01  13:01     Jennifer Mack      F          51         Delta dental

38         0:53:10  13:18     Nancy Nemcovich F          62        

39         1:00:53  15:14     Tom Raffio         M          68         Delta Dental

40         1:00:56  15:14     Neal Mcbain        M          77        

41         1:01:07  15:17     Erica Goncze       F          38        

42         1:04:35  16:09     Laurie Brown       F          57        

43         1:07:27  16:52     Heidi E Enzmann  F          29        

44         1:07:27  16:52     Michelle Shea La Sa          F          60         Millennium Running

45         1:12:09  18:03     Charlotte Armstrong         F          22         NHTI Cross Country

46         1:13:33  18:24     Angie Cummings Knot       F          55        

47         1:13:34  18:24     Shirley Merkert    F          74        

48         1:14:01  18:31     Holly Mandigo-Aly F          56         Millennium Running Club

49         1:14:01  18:31     Katie Mills           F          48         Millennium Running

 

Week Ending 12/22/24

 Week Ending 12-22-24

 

Still struggling this week.  Had a quick morning run on Wednesday but mostly just felt sluggish and knee (and hip) really bugging me this week.  Almost didn’t race on Saturday and probably shouldn’t have.  Felt awful.

 

Week – 87

Month – 267

Year – 3,931

Life – 162,662

Looking back - Dec 2019

 5 years ago: December (2019) –

I spent most of the month working my way back to running and got in some cold outdoor biking and hiking.

  

Next up was a trip with Eric Morse to Tennessee to visit a few tri-state points (places where three states meet.  We arrived in Chattanooga by noon and Eric went for a run on the Brainerd Levee while I put in 3 miles of hiking.  We drove East and stopped about halfway to our destination (Franklin NC).  Eric went off for a run while I climbed to the summit of Sheep Top and continued on for 3 mile hike.  We got into the hotel just before dark and Eric hit the road for one more run. We were up before dawn for a run (Eric) and hike (me) on the Little Tennessee River Greenway.  It was a gloomy day with drizzle and fog and temps never getting out of the 40s.  It was also a LONG drive to the trailhead for the hike to the NC/SC/GA tri-state point.  We had a little trouble finding the actual start but after that it was pretty smooth sailing.  The 7.3 mile hike took us a little less than 2.5 hours.    

After that we had another long drive to get us to the GA/TN/AL tri-state point (a walk up), then onward to Chattanooga. 

Our final full day in TN started before sunrise with a visit to the top rated donut shop and a hike along the Tennessee River.  After that we ventured to our final tri-state (TN, AL, MS) which was a short hike (.1) to a really nice steel arch and tri-marker.  After that we hit Lookout Mountain where Eric headed off for a run and I hiked to the summit getting in a nice 7+ mile hike with some excellent views.

                      

On the first day of winter (Dec 22) I headed to Nantucket to my final Reservation in my red-lining project (hiking/running every mile of every trail on all of the Trustees of the Reservations properties).  I hiked the first 12 miles and ran the last 4 (I’d started running two days before).  After nearly 4.5 hours on the sand it felt weird getting on the bike for a somewhat mad dash to the 1:30 ferry.  I made it with no time to spare and was the last person on for the ride back.  All in all a fun day.

  

I ended the month with a return to the doctor to talk about starting back.  So, after 8 weeks I tentatively began running again.