Warm Fall Run

Monday, October 11, 2010:

Another delightful but warm run on the grass & dirt trails in the park. Just 3.7 miles this time, finishing in 39 minutes, for a pace of about 10:30. Good enough - I took several pictures of the fall color and didn’t stop the watch. Nothing hurts - it’s a masterpiece.

Saturday, October 9, 2010:

The St Croix Valley Runners meet at Stillwater’s Northland Tennis Courts every Saturday, 7:00 am SHARP, rain or shine. Today was shine; we watched a beautiful sunrise as we ran through the fall color in perfect running temperatures, about 55 degrees.

The speedsters ran out ahead and Dave, Candy, and I ran the Lake McKusick route. It’s very nearly the same distance, though much hillier, but none of the course is on 55-mph highways. In fact, it’s entirely on trails or 30 mph streets, and takes us all the way around Stillwater’s Lake McCusick. We finished in about 44 minutes, the fastest I’ve run that route. It may be a little shorter than 5 miles, as is the regular route, but it’s close enough for me and I claim a pace of about 9-minute miles. No pains, no problems. It’s a masterpiece.


Most of the trails are like this. Mowed grass with two ruts, usually dirt or sand, started by park vehicles and enhanced by people and horses. The grass is often fairly tall, so I prefer to run in the ruts most of the time, except when they get too muddy, too sandy, too narrow, or too deep: