Started at the southern end in Suffern, temperature was about 47F but I warmed up quickly with the first climb. After the initial accent, the trail was pretty flat and fairly rock free. Made it to the junction with the Kakiat trail about 2 mins ahead of schedule and felt like I was rolling. Great views of Rockland County kept me busy through the next stretch and I felt pretty good when I reached my next mental marker at the junction with the Tuxedo Mt. Ivy trail. Hit the midpoint shelter a solid 25-30 mins ahead of my target and felt pretty good. Then it got tricky. The decent down to the PIP seemed to go on forever and I wasn’t even that excited when my feet hit the solid pavement of the road.
Crossing the PIP was annoying - the cars just kept coming - but finally made it across and to the Pingyp climb. Pingyp was typically challenging, but I felt like it went quickly as the footing took all my concentration. I might have pushed up it too hard because the next few miles were slow and rough. By the time I hit my next milestone at Route 106 I had lost some of the early “lead” from the earlier faster, fresher miles. I expected the next stretch from the 1779 trail to 1777 to be the most difficult… and it was. Met a hiker at the top of Cat’s Elbow who asked if I came from the Anthony Wayne parking lot. When I shouted “no, Suffern” he was super encouraging and impressed... exactly what I needed at that point! He shouted after me as I left “I hope you have someone picking you up at the other end!”
The fatigue and elevation took its toll and I hit the 1777 trail about 3 minutes behind my target. I had to push the last 1.5 miles to get under six hours. A few nice jeep roads with gentle footing allowed me to pick up a little speed, but the last climb was a bit of a slog. I ran as hard as I could down to Hessian Lake and finished with a mere five minutes to spare. I carried 3L of water and a two PB&Js, didn’t resupply and made it through most of my water and one of my sandwiches.