4 Pass Loop, Mt. Massive, and Soon to Taper

So I took two days off after the night run up Powerline, and then went big.


I did the 4 Pass Loop over in Aspen near the Maroon Bells.  It is exactly what it sounds like; 4 mountain passes strung together by trails.

It was predicted to take about 8-9 hours, but ended up taking 11hrs and 15 mins because of a 1.5 hr detour early on that not only cost that time, but also cost leg power as it was mostly a climb.

The start looks like this:

This is as inhabited and developed as any view you will see on the trail; it is very much in the wilderness.

Be prepared for lots of pictures, because the flowers and lush vegetation were overwhelming.

This sunlit valley was a picture I took from atop the detour route.  At least something nice came out of this wasted effort.

A lot of the trail looks like this

View from the trail, headed up to the first pass

View from nearly atop the first pass

Lots of wildflowers in this Alpine Valley...the camera doesn't capture the wide array of colors

A waterfall

So that was a sample of what it looks like out there.

Here is a look at the trail from above after hiking up...you can follow it all the way down the valley.

The climbing (which really means steep uphill hiking) was tough for me; it is not my strong point.  Luckily, the back side of every climb is a descent, and that is where I am at my best.  There are also a few points where you can run along the valley floor, as you can see below.

The day was very long, and tough, but hopefully it will pay off on race day.  I got a lot of good pictures out of it, so if nothing else, that was a success.

This looked so much like a giant version of a bluebonnet that I had to take a picture.

This video is just a quick look at all of the different colors of flowers that bloom right alongside the trail.

Here is a video of the last (or maybe next to last) valley floor all the way up to nearly the top of the pass.

So all of this happened last Thursday.  I took Friday and Saturday off, and then did about 5 miles of singletrack running on Sunday.

The next day I did a hike of Mt. Massive, and then took the next day off.  The following day, I did the race course from the Timberline trailhead to the Fish Hatchery.  I have taken the last two days off.

Tomorrow night, I plan to run with a local group the last 23.5 mile of the course from Fish Hatchery to the finish.  That will pretty much wrap up my long runs, and the taper begins.

Hopefully all will go well, and the taper will leave me feeling strong, refreshed, and confident on race morning.  I have been feeling slow and heavy the last few days, so hopefully all that will get lined out for a successful finish in 2 weeks (holy crap that is close).