Varvel Family: July Running

July was a crazy running month for us!

Women's Runs:

Monday night runs with the ladies are still my favorite. There is never a dull moment.

Little Kelly's:

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I love this trail!

Kelly Mountain & Rollers:

We had a great turn out for this one!

A selfie at the top of Kelly Mountain.

Buckskin Morgan:

We started our run at the same time as three mountain biking teams. The trailhead was so crazy. When the bikers passed us on the trail, we cheered, and when we passed them, they cheered for us. Good times!

I can't believe it's still so green and full of flowers up in Kelly Canyon!

Stopping to regroup after the rolly pollies.

This might have been are biggest group so far.

Little Kelly's:

The mask mandate is in place, so we wear them when we group up, but not while we're actually running.

Jennifer took this picture, and I think it's so cool. The first little bit of the trail is up the creek.

Thistle!

We were doing this trail to cover this route for the Lost Souls/Trailblazer Challenge.
Oh, and Veronika jumped a rattle snake on this run! It was so scary!

PUTS Trail Clearing & Marking:

I went up a week before PUTS for trail clearing and marking. Jenn, Charles, and I started at North Indian Creek and cleared and marked trail until all the way to Big Elk. We covered 16 miles, and cleared more stinging nettle than I thought was possible.

Jenn carried a big load of all the trail signs, poles, and markers.

Here we go!

We made it to the Garden Gnome aid station, and knew we would be catching up to Jeremy and Spencer somewhere on the climb up Garden Gnome.

We saw a moose! At first we thought it was a bear, and I got all excited. I mean, if I'm gonna see a bear out there, I want it to be when we are all armed with machetes. 😂

I'm not sure who thought it was a good idea to set me loose with this thing, but I was a bit nervous to use it!

We caught the other guys, and finally made it to the top of Garden Gnome. That's quite a climb!

It's pretty barren up there, so this is how we had to mark a lot of the trail in this section.

I love this view!

Lunch break! I was excited to start the Dry Canyon section after we ate. It's the one part of the PUTS course that I had never been on. It's also the part that took the most work.

The flowers were still in bloom.

Lots of wild roses.

This is the trail, and most of that green stuff is stinging nettle. My ankles got it really bad, and I was red, swollen, and itchy for over a week after.

This took a lot of work. This is how we cleared it. We wanted it off the trail, and a good section cleared around the trail, because we didn't want it growing back in the week before the race. There was miles of this!

Long day, but we got a lot accomplished! Post race report was that this was the best year as far as trail conditions and markings went. Yay!

Kelly Canyon Loop:

We did our final long run before PUTS. It was a 10 miler, and Mark took us on a cool loop up in Kelly Canyon. The flowers were amazing!

Love the Buckskin Morgan section.

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So many flowers!

One section had so much Indian Paint Brush!

Ready or not, it's PUTS time!

Palisades Ultra Trail Series 50K:

Ahhhh, it was finally time for PUTS! This is what we had been training all spring and summer for! Finally a race that wasn't canceled or postponed. We love this course. It's brutally hard, but also very beautiful, and right on our home turf. These are the mountains we love to train in. Mark and I did the 50K, and I'm not gonna lie, it was tough! There was almost 7000 feet of elevation gain, but it was so worth it. All the climbing is what gives you the best views.

We love our trail running community! We had friends in every race from the 1/2 marathon, to the 100 miler, friends working at aid stations to keep the runners alive and moving forward, friends sweeping the course to clean up and make sure all the runners made it in safely, friends directing and on the race board spending countless hours prepping and carrying out the event, even friends pacing the 100 milers to help them through sections of the race. We are surrounded by a great people. The human body and mind are amazing, and I can't wait to push ours a little bit farther. Stay tuned....

Results:

Tricia- 8 hrs, 50 sec. (23rd/63 overall, 3rd in age group)

Mark-8 hrs, 23 min, 38 sec. (29th/63 overall, 4th in age group)

At the starting line with Mat!

The first climb is brutal, but the view is so great!

I was so glad to see this cabin. That meant I had 3 miles of downhill!

The start of the Garden Gnome climb. This part kicked my butt!

Almost to the top!

Mark finishing!

Done!

Dan finished the 100 miler a little bit ahead of us. He looks so dazed in this picture! I can't imagine doing 100 miles, let alone on this crazy course.

The victory bell!

Yay! We did it!

Bailey and Mason were out of town, but they had cookies delivered to us when we got home. 😋

IFTR Group Runs:

Trail Hollow:

We had a big group on Trail Hollow for an early sunrise run.

Hahaha, Nick was in his car for a work call, but we wanted him in our picture.

Beautiful sunrise.

Stacy and I showing off the great mattress that Dan advertised on the trail running page.

Grandpa Henry's Meatloaf:

Instead of the usual 'informal' group runs we usually have, this one was posted as 'formal'. That should explain all the tutus. This is always a fun one! It's always quite a climb up, and then some fun running down.