Normal, everyday run today.
http://runkeeper.com/user/SethLK/activity/16116942#
I always love it when this song comes on though. It's my favorite running song.
Once again the official video is not embedable and I can't stand remake videos so I'm going with the live version.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Monday, September 6, 2010
Glacial River Trail: Fort Atkinson, WI
The Glacial River Trail in Ft Atkinson is a nice 8.5 mile one way trail that basically goes along Hwy 26 from downtown Ft Atkinson in a southwesterly direction. Full disclosure, I did not start at the very beginning of the trail. I have a good parking spot at a park that is about a half mile from the beginning so there is .5 miles that I have not run on this trail. I'm going to go ahead and say that I did the whole thing anyway. If that bothers you, I apologize but not really. Let's see the trail!
The first mile goes down Janesville (I think?) Rd past some baseball fields and the world famous Fireside Theater. There's some nice junk art along the way. It should be said that this is mainly a bike trail but I can run farther than most people can bike. It takes a little over a mile to get out of town.
Leaving Fort Atkinson and heading out to the countryside. Out of the picture on the right side you get to go past the lovely water treatment plant. The smell is much more noticeable on the way back in to town.
It's not that bad really.
After three or so miles on a nice paved trail going out of town there is a mile or so on a country road which makes some nice scenery of old barns and rolling hills.
Entering back onto the trail at 4.5 miles. No horses allowed. I always run with my phone (with ipod and runkeeper) in a ziplock bag so I'm happy that it made an appearance in this picture.
The trail continues along, paved for only a couple more miles before dissolving into gravel. The scenery stays pretty much the same. It is a nice, tree-lined lane the whole way.
It's an easy run for the miles because it's just an out and back and flat almost the whole way but never boring. Very fun and good for running without thinking too much about it.
This bridge is not the end.
But only a half mile past is the end. There is a mileage post next to this sign but I covered the lens with my finger on that picture. I was really excited to get to the end of the trail. I haven't run an entire trail in a couple years. My excitement was brief because I soon realized I had another eight miles back to my car.
There are some Indian Mounds along the way on this trail. I was very tempted to take a detour to view the mounds because they're a rare treat. But then I remembered that I has beer waiting for me at home and I wanted to get to that so I skipped the mounds for now.
Getting back into town. Almost done.
Fun time run. It's also the longest I run since the Madison Marathon which was on Memorial Day of this year. So I guess I took the whole summer off. Now I'm standing at Labor Day and figuring it's time to get serious about running once again. Here's the route:
Also, it helps when you get a killer saxophone solo during a long run:
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Lake Loop
The most perfect running loop in the city, with the most perfect weather makes for a great run. I started the Lake Loop at Lake Park on the eastern side of downtown Milwaukee. It's a great part of the trail that goes through wooded parks, a golf course, the Milwaukee Art Museum, and of course Lake Michigan.
Lake Park Golf Course is a fun little par three.
North Point is like the oldest lighthouse in the world or something. I thought the bridge was cooler than the lighthouse.
The trail starts up above Lake Michigan and goes behind the tennis courts on Lincoln Memorial. It's a really nice part of the trail because you're right in downtown with the high rise buildings right on top of you, but the tree canopy gives a nice cover.
You also get to pass many Milwaukee landmarks like the art museum,
Summerfest grounds and that one bridge,
and Bradford Beach
It was a great run. Can't wait to do it again.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Oak Leaf Trail Continued
Killed three more miles off this trail today. That does not include the one mile it takes for me to get there at the Wauwatosa Village bridge and two miles to get back home. Today I turned west at St John's, which is exactly one mile from my house. This took me through Hoyt Park, down Swan Blvd, and past Hansen Golf Course. The trail continues west at Watertown Plank Rd but I had to turn east and go two more miles to get home. I only took one picture, behind the Wisconsin Lutheran College football field. I was not able to capture the Koine Bus in the background.
It was a slow jog as I am super exhausted from a grueling studio session. You're lucky I even went to the effort of doing this run today.
I'm taking tomorrow off. Another studio day with a shi-ton of tracking plus the opening day of college football means I will not run on Thursday. I can't wait for Wake Forest/Presbyterian U.
I was treated by my runkeeper playlist to some Bat For Lashes, which really made my jog. The video might be better than the song, and it's one of my favorite songs.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Oak Leaf Trail
Today I started the long journey down the Oak Leaf trail in Milwaukee County. Since the east-west connector is so close to home and I hit it most days I decided to take it as far as I could.
I like the way it starts (from my starting point at home). I go down past St. John's Lutheran toward the village of Wauwatosa and head down along the Menomonee River (I think). After passing through Hart Park it goes through some residential area along the river.
Also I found one of the mountain bike trails that juts off.
As I said before the biggest challenge to this trail is that there aren't really any natural loops so it's hard to get more than three or four miles at a time before it's time to turn around. This time I got three before I hit this sign:
Oops. This is the end of the Oak Leaf Trail for today and the beginning of what's apparently the Hank Aaron State Trail. Cool. I did about a mile of that before I turned around.I continued along the newfound Hank Aaron which was basically a sidewalk in a neighborhood north of Wick Field. I decided to turn around before I got the Miller Brewery.
I haven't written a lot about the run itself because it was a pretty plain experience. It was a nice run in the city and what made it trail running was the fact that there were signs that said it was a trail. There were some really nice parts where the trail left the road and went into a wooded area. I ended up taking Blue Mound Rd from where it splits with Wisconsin Ave all the way home. I did get a nice picture on the way.
I also ran pretty fast.
So three miles of the 100 mile excursion is done. This will take a couple days.
One thing I thought of was that if I ever play in Major League Baseball, or if my softball league gets entrance music, this will be my at-bat song:
(Unfortunately they don't allow embedding of the real video for this song so just listen, but don't watch because there's nothing to see.)
Monday, August 30, 2010
Milwaukee: Oak Leaf Trail
The map may be kind of hard to read. I made it as big as I could but you probably still can't read it. The Oak Leaf Trail more or less goes around Milwaukee County with a few loops and connections along the way. It is made up of five main parts which run through county parks and along municipal streets. There is also 5-10 miles of mountain bike trails.
The Oak Leaf Trail is the main portion. It is marked in red on the map. This is the trail that circumnavigates Milwaukee County. The Oak Leaf comes in at 71 miles. There is is an east-west connection, marked in yellow, that starts near where I live on the far west side of Milwaukee, or Wauwatosa, and ends up around the Bay View area on the southeast side. That connector is 15.5 miles long. There is the Lake Loop marked in blue on the East Side right on the lakefront. I've run this route about 600 times but will be more that happy to do it again and snap a few photos. This is one of my favorite runs in the city. There's always lots of activity along the lake which provides some fun scenery. It is officially listed at 5.9 miles. but I usually extend it a little to just over 6 miles. Sometimes I'll keep going up the lake to Capitol Dr. or head around the UWM campus and get 8-10 miles out of it. Finally there is the Lincoln Creek Spur marked in green. This is a tiny 1.7 mile thing off of Hampton Ave. I don't know much about this one.
This could take a while to complete. There isn't really an opportunity to hit a big chunk at a time since there aren't really any loops, it'll have to be mostly out and backs. The good thing is I can do parts of this at any time during the week. No matter where I've run in Milwaukee I've usually ended up on one part of this trail or another for at least a little bit. I was on the east-west connector for a time today, but I won't count it yet. Here it is though:
I might try to start on some of this monster trail tomorrow. Until then here's a song I like.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Invitation
I would also say, that if anyone (eventually) reading this would like to join me on one of these little trips to a running or biking destination you should. It's always more fun with other people. It doesn't have to be a 10 mile run every time either, although it could be.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Madison
I'm a big fan of running in Madison. I know it's not really a trail run, but whatever. That's the beauty of "trail" running. There's trails everywhere.
That says "Capital City Trail" so it counts even if it is just a sidewalk for college kids to ride their bikes on.
I figured Madison would be a good place to start since it is the center of the state. Everyone comes back to Madison at some point. Whether it's for a football game, a night out on State St, a field trip to the capitol, or going to school it's the place to be.
It's also become kind of a running haven for me. I've run the Madison Marathon twice. In 2009 I ran a 3:25 and gained a ton of confidence as a runner and in 2010 I ran a 3:40 and lost a lot of confidence as a runner (it was 87 degrees and I was out of shape). Anyway, I like to run there once a month or so.
This time I made sure to hit the main spots.
Camp Randall
and I think Monona Terrace is in the first picture. On second look, maybe not. I did run on State St but did not get a picture. Maybe next time. I know I'll be back.
The running itself was ok. I started strong, but didn't necessarily hold on to my momentum. I was taking some pictures and I didn't realize it was going to be almost 90 out. Anyway, here is the route:
What's up next? Hopefully something cool.
Outdoors in Wisconsin
I started out in East Troy, a small community about 30 miles southeast of Milwaukee. It also happens to be very near the southern unit of the Kettle Moraine state forest which is in my opinion some of the most beautiful parts of our country. I also began to embrace running and general outdoor activities which are tailor made for this area.
I've since run tens of thousands of miles and explored most of the state on my various travels. I've gotten in to destination runs around Wisconsin and have decided it's time to document some of these excursions. This picture is from when I used to run on the East Side of Milwaukee. I need to get back there sometime soon.
I know I can't run every trail in the state, but between running and mountain biking, I think I can come up with some pretty cool pictures and maybe some stories if I ever learn how to articulate my own thoughts.
Enjoy.
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