Running in Utah Part 3: The Canyons

Today's post comes as the third installment in the "Running in Utah" series. Parts 1 and 2 covered inversions (you can find that here) and altitude (here). Today's post is related but distinct: the canyons.

The equivalent of a canyon in Appalachia is a hollow. GAH--that word is actually hard to type, because it's pronounced "holler" and that -ow at the ends just kills me to type. Anyway, in Appalachia, the folds between the mountains, where roads often wind and homes nestle, is a holler (I CAN'T DO IT!). Here, in the much bigger Rockies they are canyons. Around Salt Lake we have some canyons people know well because they host popular ski resorts like Snowbird and Alta. We have more residential canyons like Emigration. But to today's point, regardless of where or what they are, we run them. 

Below are the elevation profiles for the race I did in April, the one I'm doing next week, and my full in September. Why would you not race here???

Salt Lake Half

Utah Valley Half

Top of Utah Marathon

And amazingly, people train in the canyons. About a week ago I took my parents up Emigration Canyon for breakfast and a drive. We saw people running and biking all the way up the canyon. My Dad watched the bikers in wonder, comparing their calves and hearts to those found in other parts of nature. 

At the top of Emigration Canyon, a gain of about 1300 feet over 8 miles

The courses are fantastic, but training with this as a backdrop ain't shabby either. I took these at the end of last week's mile repeat speed workout. During the run, we got to watch the sun rise over the mountains, casting every shade of gorgeous across the landscape. 

If you're considering a destination race, I hope you'll consider Utah. Just be sure to arrive a few days in advance to acclimate to the altitude! I'm super excited to welcome a friend from St. Louis to town later this week, as she'll be running Utah Valley with me on Saturday. I hope she enjoys running these hollers as much as I do!

Mondays On Notice

Today begins a new blog feature that I'm calling Mondays on Notice. The name borrows a bit from Stephen Colbert's list of things that are on notice, which in his case includes Lutherans and bears. Obviously this means that Mondays are permanently on notice, but I think we can all agree to that. Each week I will be featuring something I would like to add to my list of those things on notice.  Some of these will be running related, some will not. With that, my first Item on Notice:

Excessively short layovers.

Why? This past weekend we were traveling. Our travels involved  an almost 2 hour long layover in Detroit, which was absolutely perfect. We had enough time to exit security and see these people. (Sorry for the photo quality. This was my first attempt to use pics from my phone and I haven't quite figured out how to make it all work yet.)

And a little of this.

 

 And it was fantastic. I got to squeeze my nieces, drink coffee with my SIL, catch up with my brother and Dad (who is there because Kdot broke her collar bone and cannot drive, pick up babies, etc. Ouch!), then mozy on back through security and back to our gate. None of which I could have done with an excessively short layover. Plus, really short layovers induce all sorts of anxiety about delays and missed connections. So there you have it, Excessively Short Layovers, I hereby put you on notice!

At the other end of our flight, I finally got in a run I've dreamed of for a very long time--mountains! While there was a heat index of 112 at home, I was soaking up 4 miles of this gorgeousness. I think I had forgotten what mountain running felt like. It works those hammies and I loved it! This was the view as I started out. 

The trail is 2 miles long. I came across this at the back end, about 1 mile into the trail. So picturesque!

I did the whole trail twice for a total of 4 miles. It got really steep in a few places, so I wasn't that surprised to see that my pace was well over a minute per mile slower than usual. It was tough and just exactly what I'd hoped for.