Today was my final interesting Colorado adventure run. I got up early again, which was very good because I was doing the Manitou Incline. It is an old cog railway up the side of the mountain, near Colorado Springs. I knew it would be packed too.
I started early and it still was crazy hot by the end. I was sweating a lot and used most of my water. I wore shorts and short sleeves of course.
Because I knew parking would be crazy, I started in town. The plan was to use that as a warmup. The road running was boring and it had a bit of uphill too. It got my lungs going. I began to actually walk near the trailhead.
This trail is just crazy. You can see a lot of the way up and straight up it is. It is nearly 2,000 feet of gain in not much over a mile. It is quite the challenge. In the beginning, the wooden steps seemed too high and difficult to go up.
I continued up. For the most part, I was passing people. It was steep and tough for sure. However, I've been on steeper stuff or at least as steep as some of the worst parks. I've never been on something so steep for so long though.
What I thought would really get me would be the elevation, but I guess I've now adapted. My breathing was labored, but not nearly as bad as most people. I passed one black guy that was struggling.
I was in no rush myself, so I tried to be smart. I rested every so often to recover. I saw a big boulder way up and I focused on getting to it. It seemed to take forever. I didn't look up much, but when I did it was crazy. People were so much higher than me. It did help to look back too and see my progress.
The legs were burning a little early, but adapted. The elevation didn't bother me. The heat and the sun beating down on me were the one thing getting to me. I didn't really get passed, but I did pass this one woman who eventually passed me back.
Some very old guy came down at one point. I think he said he did it several thousand times. That was awesome. I got to the rock and achieved one goal, but still had a long trip up. At one point I joked, "are we doing this a second time?" No one around me laughed.
I had heard about a false summit, so I was worried as I neared the top. I thought maybe there was more top. However, when were finally near the top, another guy egged me on to run up it with him. We had hiked a lot of the way together, so I ran up with him.
I rested briefly and took in the view. Now, it was time to run down the Barr Trail. This is a singletrack on the side of the incline. It keeps going up to Pikes Peak. Some hikers were on it. I was running down it though.
It was a pretty trail. There were a lot of flowers along it. I enjoyed it for a bit. However, it was just too gradual. It switchbacked a ton and seemed like it was never going down. I passed a guy running with his dog and a lot of hikers. Somehow I missed an obvious turn at one point and went nowhere.
Eventually, I was back on trail. I continued to cruise down. These miles seemed to go on and on. I was happy when I finally made it down. The sun was blazing now.
I ran back through town. I said "hi" to everyone coming up. I was glad to be nearly done. I stopped at my car pretty tired. I did recover on the downhill, so if it wasn't so hot, I could've done it a second time.
I've enjoyed all the unique adventures in Colorado. It was a fun trip for sure. Now, I'll be back to running in good, old Pennsylvania. At least I got to explore more trails, ones I may never see again.
6.55 miles - 1:48:29 (16:33 pace) 2213 feet of elevation gain
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