FKT: Daniel Moore - Kettle Moraine State Forest John Muir Blue Loop (WI) - 2020-07-18

First time at Kettle Moraine and it kicked my ass. I was definitely over confident coming into this one. I'm not a huge trail runner and almost never run faster stuff on trails so when I saw the record was 7:xx pace, I though "Oh, well that can't be that bad.." Big mistake.

I took a pretty light hearted approach to this, like it was going to be an up-tempo long run. Woke up, had some blackberries and a few sips of water then drove over to the trailhead. Temps were pretty high and I stupidly wore all black and a cotton hat. First mile was sub 7 but I was already drenched with sweat. By mile 3 I realized I had to really dial it back. I didn't bring any water or nutrition. Not sure if that was actually a mistake, but I definitely should have been hydrated coming into it. Had some lows and some highs, felt really crappy but couldn't quite pinpoint what was hurting, I just felt drained. My legs and breathing were fine but I just didn't have the pep in my step I would hope to have. And although it wasn't as nice of a effort as I had hoped, I think that made it a little more interesting.

Having said all that, it was a pretty fun run and I think I got the record. My GPS data only has me at 10.8 even though my run looks very similar to the GPS of the current record holder (The legit one, not the one that was flagged for missing the Gnome Loop). I guess someone will look at the data to confirm? Not sure how this whole FKT submission thing works. I'll definitely be back for more running in this area.

About 30 minutes after the finish, Kayla and I did some mountain biking but that go cut short by the rain. Bummer.