M.O.R.E.: It's A Beautiful Day!

Saturday, March 20, 2010

It's A Beautiful Day!

I was thinking about the U2 song as we were running this morning, because it was just that "beautiful". C and I started from Peet's at 8am this morning and headed toward Lowe's. Marathon Mom is out of town, and in our thoughts as she has a tough day ahead of her! We knew that we wanted to get in a longer run, but the way we had felt this past week, our expectations were very low. We crossed Bouquet and started toward the new housing that runs along the new houses on Newhall Ranch. We made it to the big water pipe, and had to guess how far we had gone, because my GPS ran out of power, just after the 2 mile mark. We both felt like it was over 4 miles to the pipe, so we will say we ran 8 total (probably a bit more). We also felt like we kept a pretty good pace, and when I looked back to see how we had done on the first 2 miles, we figure we may have averaged about 9.4 pace. Like I mentioned before, considering how my legs have been feeling on the shorter runs, I am more than happy with that pace. The hardest part of the run was when we stopped at Starbucks to use the bathroom, and saw all the runners who were done and having coffee. We still had the last 2 miles back to Peet's to finish. We agreed though that it is much easier to run those miles from Lowe's to Peet's and not the other way around, because it is a nice downhill most of the way! We even set our sights on another runner who was quite a ways ahead of us, and made up our minds to catch and pass her in the last half mile. It wasn't too hard since she was running pretty slow, but it kept us on pace at the very end which is always a good thing. We must have looked pretty good, because a man on a bike looked at us quite intently, and I thought he was going to turn around and join us. C thought it was my green shirt, but I am old enough to know it is the blonde hair! It was a Beautiful Day, but we missed our friend, and hope her day goes well!

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Favorite Trails

South Fork 3.1: Start from dirt parking lot on Magic Mtn Pkway and run to the loop at Wiley Bridge and return the same way.

Tesoro 3.25: Start in Albertson parking lot and take sidewalk/trail until it ends and then enter the water tower road to the top two towers where the ends. Return the same way.

Chesebrough 3.25/4.60: From Chesebrough Park, N. to Copperhill, So. on Bike Trail, turn around at Decoro, back up trail to power lines to bridge at park. Turn around at Heritage will give you 4.6 miles.

Chesebrough 3.5: Chesebrough Park down to McBean, south to Northpark Dr., the paseo trailhead. Take the paseo to Helmers and back. Very hilly.

Bridgeport 4.0: Fairly flat, run toward Lowes and under Bouquet bridge to RiverPark community until you reach the closed gates and return. For a hilly run, go north into Helmers and run up the paseo switchbacks into Northpark where the paseo ends and return the same way.

Chesebrough 4.0: N. to Copperhill to west side of river trail, run S. on Bike Trail past Decoro bridge, across Decoro to the east side of river trail, up back to power lines trail, back to park.

Chesebrough 4.0: From park down power line trail to Heritage Park and back same way.

Bridgeport 4.0: From School, cross McBean via bridge or street and head into industrial center on Ave. Scott Bridge and enter bike trail going south toward the train bridge. Turn around at train bridge and return same way or cross the bridge and head toward Peet's after crossing train bridge and back onto the Lowes Trail.

Heritage 4.0: From park, run up bike trail to Decoro, over McBean Bridge into Helmers, and into Bridgeport through lake trail back to park. Can be done in reverse. Moderately hilly.

Chesebrough 4.25: Chesebrough north to Copperhill, left to Albertson side of bike trail. Run south on trail to Decoro and cross over bridge and head north all the way to Copperhill on east side of river trail and back to the park the same way as started.

Cheese/Decoro/Helmers 4.25: From the park, down dirt trail to bike path, south to Decoro. Leave bike path at Decoro and cross paseo bridge at McBean. Stay on paseo up hill towards Helmers. Run up water tower trail once then continue on to switchbacks and paseos back to park.

Heritage/Bridgeport 3.3: Heritage Park south to McBean Bridge @ Panera. Cross and head toward Lowes bike trail and head east toward Bridgeport Park. Halfway mark is at park bathroom, head back by entering trail along the lake and back onto the bridge.

Lowes 4.25: Lowe's parking lot to McBean, cross the bridge and to South Fork. At Valencia Bridge, enter trail behind Hart Baseball diamonds. Continue on trail to Bouquet and across the bridge on the east side and back under the bridge again towards Lowes.

Peet's & Decoro 5.2: Peet's Coffee to train bridge path; to Decoro and across bridge; back down McBean side of bike trail back to Peete's.

Peet's & Wiley 6.0: Start at Peet's Coffee and head east toward South Fork trail and past the Wiley Bridge. Keep running another 200 yards to where the trail forks left and right. Turn back same way.

Peet's & Copperhill 6.0: From Peet's to bike trail heading north to Copperhill and back.

Albertson 7.0: From the Albertson parking lot on Copperhill, enter the westside bike trail and head south until the train bridge. Return the same way.

Peet's 8.5: Run to Copperhill on east side of river trail and return via train bridge on other side.

Lowes 10: Start in the Lowes parking lot. Enter the bike trail heading west. At McBean, cross the bridge and head east toward SouthFork trail. Continue on trail until you come to the Wiley bridge and head back the same way.

McBean 14: This route can be done from anywhere along the trail route. Starting from McDonald's across the post office, run to the end of the South Fork trail and return the same way, cross the McBean bridge and run on the Lowes trail until you hit Bridgeport Elementary and then cross Newhall Ranch via the bridge or street and run back towards McBean. Continue north on McBean until you hit Copperhill. At Copperhill, cross McBean and enter San Francisquito bike trail and run south on the trail until you are back at McDonalds.