Bear Canyon Trail Run to Seven Falls

I joined the Blue Pants Racing group bright and early today for my inaugural run of part of the Bear Canyon Trail to Seven Falls in Sabino Canyon. I have never run this trail before and it was a blast!

The Blue Pants Racing group was small today - just me, Laszlo, Natalie, and Jeff. My friend Steve was there on his own, and he was planning on running the same trail with Cameron at 6am, too, so they joined us!

The six of us took off, with the 4 guys in front and Natalie and I in the tail section. Natalie had already run 5 miles and was going to log 2 more for a total of 15 today for her marathon training, so she was pacing herself. I, on the other hand, was slow for no reason! Actually, I felt like I was still recovering from my racing this Spring. It is a tough trail, crossing the very rocky, sandy creek beds many times before arriving at Seven Falls. It was like a big step workout. Seven Falls was not running because of the lack of rain here in Tucson. See? Dry as can be:

Bear Canyon trail continues on, but we just did the out and back portion of it to Seven Falls. It was about 8.5 miles round trip, although it took about 1:45 for me. The guys were faster, but they were gentlemen and kept stopping periodically to let me and Natalie catch up. The end of the line! Counterclockwise: Cameron, Steve (with the victory pose), Jeff, Laszlo, and Natalie.

Here I am posing in front of the not-so-lovely 'pool' of water at Seven Falls. None of us decided on going for a swim or even a dip in the algae-filled swampy water.

Fun run! I haven't done much hilly trail running in a while, so my quads were sore the next day. I love trying out new trails.

I logged about 28 miles this week; keeping the miles down for one more week to recover. I plan on ramping back up to 40 in the next few weeks and holding steady there for the summer.

It is hotter than Hades here in Tucson. About 106-108 for our daily highs right now. I call it 'two showers a day' weather.