I run in Mission Trails fairly often and am very familiar with the majority of this route, but in the couple of weeks prior to this attempt, I did go out and run shorter sections of the course just to make sure I know every turn.
I started out a few minutes before 6:00am, taking advantage of setting the clocks back an hour in the middle of the previous night due to Daylight Savings Time. It was cool at the start, mid 50s, but not unpleasant. Goal pace was averaging out to 11:45 miles for the entire day. The first mile is a short, easy climb followed by dropping down into the middle of Suycott Valley where apparently all of the warm air from yesterday got trapped because it was at least 10 degrees warmer once I started to drop down into it. Mile is 2 is the climb up the dreaded South Fortuna stairs. I jogged until I felt like I needed to hike (which didn't take too long...). At the top of the stairs, you get a couple of small little ups and downs before hitting the first summit. Hadn't seen a single person out yet until I hit the summit and started running down towards the saddle between South and North Fortuna.
I passed by quite a few people along the way, at least ten. Passing by hikers always puts a little pep in my step so that was good. I ran about a third of the way up the climb towards the false summit of North Fortuna and then hiked the rest. Then, there is a little dip and then a short climb between the false summit and the actual summit-it is a nice, runnable section.
After tagging the North Fortuna summit, you backtrack down to the saddle again and drop down a super steep hill known locally as The Widowmaker. I didn't complete bomb it but definitely took it fast. At the bottom, it flattens out quite a bit and you get a gentle but rocky downhill that follows the dried up riverbed (it flows nicely during winter and spring and my kids love to hike there). As it bottoms out, you cross a bridge and go by the dam and start the climb up Kwaay Paay.
I was about a third of the way up Kwaay Paay when my phone made a weird sound I'd never heard it make before so I pulled it out of the pouch I carry it in, hoping that it wasn't Strava shutting off on me or something...apparently, it was trying to unlock itself as it bounced around in the pouch and it had been disabled. The timer said it still had 11 minutes before I could unlock it so I just held on to it and waited. I wasn't sure if Strava was still running, but I was glad that I had decided to carry my old Garmin GPS watch from 7 or 8 years ago just in case. I knew that just before I hit the summit, it should be telling me I was at 7 miles, and sure enough, while still disabled, it shouted out at me that I hit 7 miles just before touching the big sign at the summit. Phew!
Got it unlocked on the way down which was good because the road section was coming up and I had only actually ran along the road the way the route goes once before and I wanted to check and make sure I made the correct turns to get to the Big Rock Trail base of Cowles.
The sun was starting to peak through the clouds about a mile up the Cowles trail, right as I hit the service road section and it was really warming up. Luckily, as I hit the summit, it ducked behind the clouds and I had shade all the way from the Cowles summit to the Pyles summit and back to the Cowles summit. I was still feeling good and I tried to push on that section, even tough I knew that barring a nasty twisted ankle on the way down Cowles (which I have done multiple times) I would beat the previous best time.
I hit the top of Colwes for the second time and started the switchbacks down and it was crowded! I guess the masses were out working off their Halloween candy from the night before. A lot of people had their headphones blaring and couldn't hear me saying excuse me to try to squeeze through but I made it work and got down fairly quickly, still feeling good, no rolled ankles, in a second under 3:10. Pretty pleased with the day's effort and it was a great day to hit all of the peaks again!
I drank about 30 ounces of red gatorade and about half a liter of water. All I ate besides the PBJ before I started was two fun size snickers that I pilfered from last night's Halloween candy bowl. I still had a ton of water left and a little bit of gatorade because I wasn't sure if my wife was going to be able to pick me up and it is about 5 or 6 miles with one long climb back to where I parked if you go the shortest possible route, but luckily she was able to. I took a nice 1.75 mile cool down jog back to a main intersection and got picked up. I ran completely solo the entire time and did not resupply, although there is a drinking fountain near the base of Kwaay Paay if one wanted to at that point. It was a great morning!