Another Crappy Mt. Tammany Run

This time of year is killing me.  The temperatures are getting warmer, but there's still plenty of snow and trail running is hard.  At least clear trails are only a few weeks away.

I didn't get around to running on Monday.  I wanted to make sure to do so today.  I headed to Mt. Tammany again.  I figured that it would be packed down after the weekend and starting to melt.  I got there late in the afternoon and was hoping for a few loops through dinner time.

When I got there, it began to rain.  It was cloudy, but in the 40s.  It was kind of weird wearing shorts with snow.  I had on my new lightweight jacket over a short sleeve shirt.  The jacket did keep off the rain, but also made me a bit warm.  I used my hat to keep water out of my eyes.

I'm not sure why, but I expected fairly solid and runnable conditions.  I thought there would be some snow melt, but really there wasn't much.  I ran slowly early on with my MICROspikes.  Even the spikes didn't help much.  There wasn't much grip on the wet, slushy snow.  It was particularly difficult going uphill.

I hiked the first steep part.  My back was a little sore.  Otherwise, I felt decent.  I was just slightly frustrated.  It was good to get to the flattened out part.  I was able to run some of that, but not much.

Near the lower overlook, there were deer on the trail.  There must've been 6 or 7 of them.  That was pretty cool and they took off when they saw me.  The trail was covered in deer tracks.  There were no cars in the lot on this day and I didn't see anyone else throughout the run.  It was nice having things to myself.

It wasn't long and I had to hike again.  I was getting very annoyed.  I just want to run.  This trail is too much work in conditions like today.  I was cursing over and over again.

I tried to speed hike a little.  Going through the very rocky section wasn't too bad.  It is steep, but the rocks are still mostly covered.  Some of the larger ones are now showing though.  I saw three more deer near the top.

Eventually I made it to the summit.  It wasn't without more complaining though.  It was a little foggy at the view.  I now headed on the Blue Trail.

Running this part on the ridge was kind of annoying.  I lost my footing several times and my foot fell deep into snow.  I ended up walking a lot of it. 

I had been looking forward to the descent.  However, it wasn't much better.  Sometimes the trail was packed down.  I could run about 5 steps.  Then on like the 6th step, my foot would sink in 6 inches to a foot into the snow.  It was quite frustrating.

I also slid down the wet snow, rather than running down.  It was kind of like skiing (I assume).  It was a slow go.  It was kind of frustrating.

It wasn't long and I was down to the bottom.  The waterfall was running now.  Finally, I went onto the AT and was back to the parking area.  This was too frustrating of a loop, so I just ended my run there.  It was disappointing, but at least I got something done.

I really hope I can run again tomorrow.  It is hard to get out there in these conditions.  I would like to go to Trexler.  Running 10 miles would be great.

3.63 miles - 56:43 (15:37 pace) 1308 feet of elevation gain
10th Summit of Mt. Tammany of 2015