Wind Gap AT Snow Repeats

Yesterday was a perfect off day.  We had snow and ice.  That meant that I was back at it today.  Of course complicating the matter was the additional few inches of snow, covered by ice.  I knew it would be a tough one.

It was also quite cold today.  I went with my usual attire though.  I planned to be running up and down the mountain, so I figured that would be enough and it was.  At times, I was sweaty and other times chilly.  The sun was out and that always helps.

The plan was to head to Wind Gap and run repeats on the AT.  Since I figured few, if any, hikers were out, I knew I'd be making the trail.  It would get more runnable as I went along.  The whole switchback climb gains about 500 feet in less than a mile.

I got to the southbound trailhead.  No surprise, not a single set of tracks.  I was the first person through at all since the storm.  Hiking up the steep beginning was tough.

I was able to run a little bit at the start, but that didn't last.  Even if I could run up the hill, it was taking a lot of effort.  The snow was probably a foot deep with ice on top of it.  I mainly just hiked the trail on the first route up.  Even that was exhausting.

I finally got through a few switchbacks and my watch was around 275 feet of gain.  I decided that this was good enough.  I'd just run a bunch of repeats.  I headed back down.

I was sort of able to run down the hill.  It was slow though.  I tried to make a new set of tracks whenever I could.  Often times, I'd step on the edge of my original tracks, to make them wider.

It was good to get to the bottom.  I now sort of had a path.  Still, I had to hike more than run on the second repeat.  This was far from fast.  It was a great workout though.  Before long, I got to the end again and turned around.  There were some animals tracks near the top.  It was neat being the first person through.

This was wearing me out, so both at the top and bottom, I rested very briefly.  I'd take in some water too.  I had over 500 feet of gain after two repeats.  I started back up on the third run.  Again, I was able to run a little bit more.  The one problem is that the snow underneath had no grip.  It was a soft powder.

I also had to be careful of ice covered branches.  There were a couple low lying ones.  One hit me in the head one time, as I was looking down.  At least I avoided my eyes.

Now that I almost had a trail completely made, I was able to really blast downhill.  That was a ton of fun.  It was over in no time though.  Every ascent was slow and every descent was super fast.

I headed back up for repeat number four.  By now, the trail was a lot more runnable.  However, my energy level was getting lower.  I was nearly an hour into this run and only a little over 3 miles.  It was certainly slow, but a great workout.  This was a key repeat, because it would get me over 1,000 feet of gain.  It actually got me just over that point.

I enjoyed blasting down the hill one more time.  I was almost out of control.  I got to the bottom in no time and decided that I'd do a fifth and final repeat.  This would put me around 4 miles and comfortably over 1,000 feet of gain.

I was so dead by now.  Even some sections that I ran earlier were a struggle.  My legs were tired and my back was sore.  I hiked a lot more on this one than the previous repeats.  When I got to the end, I decided to clear some more trail.  I hiked up the next couple switchbacks.  There were even more drifts and it was a super slow go.  I did see some turkey tracks.

Finally, the snowdrifts were too much.  I headed down.  I sort of ran downhill here, but there wasn't much of a trail yet, so it was slow.  Then, I got to the part I had done five repeats of.  That was so much faster and I flew down it.  It was so much fun.  I finished up with over four miles and 1,300 feet of elevation gain.  Perhaps more importantly, I created a great trail to run on later in the week.  I can now do more repeats there if needed and get a faster and more runnable workout.  I just have to hope for no more snow.

Tomorrow, I'm not sure what the plan is.  I think I'd like to try to run and hike two loops at Mt. Tammany.  That is a popular hiking place, so I'm hoping for some tracks through there.  The rocks could make it icy though.  Still, I can't imagine it any worse than when it was all ice, when Ryan and I were up there a couple weeks ago.  Heading to Wind Gap again is another fall back plan of course.  Lehigh Gap might be okay too.  The bottom line is I want more elevation!

4.33 miles - 1:20:43 (18:37 pace) 1332 feet of elevation gain