Cleve­land Dam to Cypress Bowl Return – var­i­ous distances

This was our first offi­cial group run on the first half of the course. It was a chance to see where the snow was at and find out just how fun it is to nav­i­gate Holly­burn Mountain

. Actu­ally, it’s great fun whether you know your way around or not, right Mike W.? And that is a good way to figure out where the myriad of trails and ski runs end up. That is, of course, if you’re in a nice little group with you’re best run­ning pals.

I’m hear­ing lots of sto­ries of bears and fast melt­ing snow. There’s no rela­tion between the two but that’s what I’m hear­ing. Or maybe there is some effect of fast melt­ing snow, tons of sun and emerg­ing foliage on where the bears are roam­ing. I think so.

Sadly, I was not able to do the train­ing run on Sunday. Not because I didn’

t want to but because I was in the middle of moving, oh joy. In fact, as I did my spiel and sent the 50-ish run­ners off I was quite melan­choly think­ing of the past years and the mul­ti­tude of great times I’ve had run­ning around and around the trails of Holly­burn day and night. I really wish I could have gone. Next time.

I’m sure that people did their own cre­ative wan­der­ing. I know that some just went to the snow­line that I think was a few min­utes below the top of the Holly­burn Chute. And I know that Gilles and Kirsten went the full dis­tance to Cypress Bowl park­ing area and said that the last sec­tion of trail through the trees was actu­ally not too bad. Gilles told me he saw one group of four do the same thing. I can tell you this: the snow will be gone for sure by race day.

I hope train­ing is going well for every­one. This is a cru­cial time when you’re push­ing your­self hard and find­ing the bal­ance between train­ing and rest­ing. Both are equally impor­tant. And I hope you’re trying out dif­fer­ent sus­te­nance and drinks to figure what works best. Now is the time and not on race day.

The next run is one of my favourites: Grouse to Top of Sey­mour Grind Return – Long Option to Old Buck. This is your chance to ignore your time and speed, put your head down and just do it. Get in a group, chat, sing, joke, and get it done. And when you get back to Grouse you can think about the first couple of runs we did this season and real­ize how easy they were.

As a reminder, even though there is water along the way, remem­ber to fill up and drink lots, espe­cially if it’s very hot like it has been lately. Get your elec­trolytes (eLoad is a spon­sor of the event this year). Bring some food (carb BOOM! or Sharkies per­haps) and spare cash. Bring your happy smil­ing faces and cheery feet. And show up at 7:30 am in the Grouse Mtn. park­ing lot.

Although I may be still occu­pied at another event on the North Shore this week­end, I hope to see you and join you for this one. If not I’ll be think­ing about you and that great BP trail.

Craig Moore
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