In Miami

I haven't updated anything here in a really long time. It's been a decent winter in Wisconsin and I've been running some pretty good miles all through the cold and snow but nothing really seemed noteworthy enough to put on the internet. As for the past goal of running the whole Oak Leaf Trail in Milwaukee, I did accomplish that. I didn't put anything up here because it would've been pretty repetitive. Once the weather breaks in WI what I'll do is bike the whole thing at once with my RunKeeper on. That way I'll be able to display the whole map at once. That'll be cool. 

The pictures above though, show a bit of a departure from the winter of Wisconsin.

My running the past few months has been in preparation for the Miami Marathon which will take place in a few days on Sunday, January 30th. I'm prepared, I think it'll go well. It's really nice here in Miami. A little humid but I don't mind sweating. These pictures are from outside of Jess's gated community in Doral. This morning was a tempo run and tomorrow is just an easy 4 miles as the last run before the big race. I plan to get some expo, prerace, and postrace pictures. 

http://runkeeper.com/user/SethLK/activity/24427446

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.

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:

http://runkeeper.com/user/SethLK/activity/15984732

Also, it helps when you get a killer saxophone solo during a long run:

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.

http://runkeeper.com/user/SethLK/activity/15848205#

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.

http://runkeeper.com/user/SethLK/activity/15696003#

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.

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.

http://runkeeper.com/user/SethLK/activity/15632348

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.)