Sunday, January 11, 2009

Mt. Tam Loop

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Jonathan Gunderson and I at the top of Mt. Tam.


Well that was a great weekend of running trails with people. Second weekend in a row of having company in my long runs; I'm spoiled, quite a departure from my usual solo adventures in the Headlands and Mt. Tam. Too much to put into one post I'll just start with Saturday's run.

Jon and I got started early Saturday morning at a starting point just North of the Golden Gate Bridge. We hauled with no specific plan, made it up as we went. It wasn't until we were almost two hours into our run did we decide to shoot for the top of the mountain. The weather was good and we knew the views would be spectacular. Unfortunately the sun was so strong it blew out a lot of the pictures.

It worked out well, his ankle was feeling funny and I strained an ab muscle during the week strength training. We were both not running at 100%. He was doing better than I was though. We made good progress nevertheless and covered a lot of ground. Ran a good part of the Miwok course and my favorite section of the Northface 50-miler. The last hour had us hustling at our best speed for the car so he could make an appointment with his fiance. Nothing like the fear of being late to give you that extra push:)

A very good day and we covered about 30+ miles. Next up, PCTR's Angel Island 25k.

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Looking back towards San Francisco, the city is off to the right, in the horizon.

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Making our way back down and back towards the Golden Gate Bridge.

12 comments:

  1. Anonymous11:56 PM

    What a great day to be up there, it looks like a gorgeous day. Can't believe this weather we are having, I actually ran in shorts and a t-shirt in the forest. Gotta love the west coast! :-)

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  2. Wow, what incredible views! Great pictures, Rick, as always. And what a beautiful day to be on the trails. Looks like the weather was fantastic!

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  3. What a perfect day! It's not your camera, is it? Pictures are just so bright and sunny:)

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  4. Wow. I'm jealous. What great shots and what a great place to get some trail running in.

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  5. great run....thanks for the call inquiring about Bandera...sometimes I envy you N. Cali boys....
    Then I think, well I still get to live in TEXAS...and everything seems alright :)

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  6. It was so nice to come back to the Bay to weather like this! Hope it's as lovely this weekend... Looks like a great run.

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  7. Great run and great photos! Tell me, what camera do you use, I am looking to upgrade. My wife's in SF on business this week I begged to go, she made me sit down and said no!

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  8. Great pictures (as always). That Mt. Tam is way the heck up there, isn't it? LOL

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  9. wow - 30 miles just like that. wow. i can only contemplate the notion from afar. and you carried no water/food/nothing? that i see in pictures at least. only problem with this great weather is the difficultly in being at work all day. sigh.

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  10. Woooah great pics! Thanks for sharing.

    Wait stupid question...how do you strain an ab muscle?

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  11. Andy: Unbelievable weather, I do hope we get a lot of rain for February and March though. We need it.

    Jean: Thanks. It was a good day for pictures.

    Olga: Oh man it was bright and sunny. I couldn't use some of the pictures because it was too bright and sunny.

    Tony: No worries man, we'll get some snow free running at Rocky.

    Dave: No problem Dave, I was dying to know how you did.

    Victoria: Looks like we will have the same weather for this weekend. Crazy huh.

    Stuart: I use a cheap Nikon camera. Sometimes I take a lot of pictures of the same subject so I have options then I run it through photo software that lets me adjust the contrast and some cropping. Sorry to hear the trip was a no go:)

    Jo-Lynn: Not as high as your Mt. Diablo though.

    Samantha: Naw, we carried food and gear. We took off our packs prior to having our pictures taken. After a weekend of running I had no problem staying indoors and resting:)

    Jaymie: I think I strained it doing situps on a slanted board. Then I think I made it worse by continuing on the other core workouts. It's better now though. Thanks.

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  12. How is your ab muscle doing? Oh wait I just read ^ that it's doing better now! Glad to hear it! Keep up the great work!

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