Training Log Archive: Swampfox

Having found a solitary tick crawling on me after o-running at Pelican Bay, and having dealt with said tick with extreme prejudice, I am prepared to declare that the Laramie Range is now tick free for the remainder of 2014. I am also prepared to be proven wrong, but it is a fact that this is a pretty tick sparse area to begin with.

Pelican Bay--the water feature itself--was the biggest I've ever seen it, about twice as wide an expanse of water as is shown on the map. California may be in drought, but we clearly are not.

C • WY submorons 3

Memorial Day Weekend at hand, and most of the roads in the National Forest (between Laramie and Cheyenne) are still closed. That's going to make some campers happy for sure.

Set Daze 1 at Yellow Pine. I spent a little time this afternoon designing what I thought would make a nice opener, and I didn't have to change a thing. Still a lot of snow out in the terrain, but it might be gone by August, if we get a run of a few 100+F days somewhere in there.

Not quite sure how to score the contest. Several roads up top in the Forest were opened last week, but the vast majority of the roads remain closed (or at least they were closed yesterday.) That's kind of a half win for the roads. No ticks, so the ticks clearly lose. And our permit for Laramie daze arrived in the mail today.

So, however the contest gets scored, it's Daze on! Which is the main thing.

And now we're getting our first hail storm of the year. That means it's finally spring in Laramie.

Intervals on double track, some up, some down, some all around.

Trees were leafing out in town today. Premature leafing? Probably the trees know best.

More work at the new addition to Remarkable Flats, followed by some running to take a look at the Daze 3 area, which remains quite wet where it is not snow bound. Much rushing water where normally you never see water at all. Even saw 2 mallard ducks up on Browns Landing, a first.

While mapping today I came across a nice pair of balanced boulders that could be the pick (co-pick?) for Boulder of the Year. They're spectacular enough, but I'm not quite sure how well they will photograph yet. I also found (and mapped) a mini balanced boulder--quite legitimate in size to make the map, but in a location so anti-prominent it's almost not noticeable until you're very nearby.

After mapping, I headed across the street for some easy running, with the main goal of marking some barbed wire hidden in sage that I think the Forest Service might remove this summer. It won't be an easy job.

Biked by the river earlier in the day, and the river had risen considerably overnight. Not much free board until large sections of the bike path are underwater. There was one very long, skinny snack on the path. I did not pick it up because I didn't want to get snack bit.

C • Snack 5