Doublemint Run

I thought I was being clever with the play on Doublemint Gum, but I realized that was "two, two mints in one", where the run was two, two runs of one course.  Close.  Mindy and I were in our back down week.  I think the "plan" was actually calling for 10 and 8 this weekend.  Well, we did two tens, both on the same route.

Saturday, it was Mindy, me and a new trail runner, Sue.  Sue was up for the distance, but was worried about keeping pace.  Mindy and I assured her that we weren't gonna be pushing the pace at all; whatever she had would be what we would do.  She was a good sport, handling our sight-seeing on the Tryon Wiggles just fine.

Sunday, it was a larger crew.  We started out with Ian, Zak, Randy, Danielle (who'd already put in miles towards her long run), Mark (new to running with the Monsters), Mindy, Rick, and me.  I had to drop off the back to pee.  Rick waited for me.  A little further up the trail, Mindy was hanging back for us, too.  We'd all joined up again along the Lawrence Rd stretch, when someone stopped Rick, Mindy and me for directions.  Did we know how to get to Bradbury?  Um, ye-ah!  Somewhere in the directions, he asked if we were Trail Monsters.  :D  Did he know about the Big Brad Ultras?  Yup.  He was gonna do the Pineland 50 this May.  I hoped he ran into some TMs on his run, but I don't think anyone saw him on the trails.

Dark blue area with lots of arrows - the lost zone

That took long enough so we had no designs on catching up with the rest of the group.  Just when we reached the power lines, we found Mark waiting for us.  He decided he'd be more comfortable with our pace for a while.  I hope he still felt that way after we spent 1.9 miles on the 1 mile of trail that is the east side equivalent of the O.  I think we all had fun.  I know Mindy and I were fine (I think this bodes well for Peaks 50, that and our Scoutland to Triffittville bushwackfest!).

When we finally made it back to the Connector, Rick lost a shoe in the mud.  Somewhere before getting back to the Boundary Trail at the Brad, Rick's knee started acting up :(  I gave him the key to car.  Mark, Mindy, and I kept on the planned route.  We met up with Danielle somewhere on the Tote.  She ran with us back to the parking lot, but needed to tack on some tenths to get to her 20 mile goal.  Rick was already back.  I hope he was able to stop before doing too much damage.

Chuck, Katy, and her mom, along with River and Brooke, showed up just as we were heading out to E&Ls.