The first half of my out-and-back FKT.
I have never run at Androscoggin Riverlands State Park before, and decided that going for this FKT would be a good workout before a 50k trail race this weekend. I began at Conant Road (the southern end of the trail) because it was 10 minutes shorter of a drive, but it also turned out to be smart because this end was more technical, muddy, and hilly - which I prefer at the beginning/end of a run (I always feel the worst in the middle miles, so it helped that they were more runnable). The trail itself, especially the southern half, was extremely muddy. A combination of record amounts of rain this summer and the many ATVs that frequent this park left the trail pretty messy. I took it cautiously and made sure to stay on my feet in the swampy sections. The trail was fairly easy to follow - there are a few confusing intersections so it helps to have the route downloaded to your watch. When I finished I was a little annoyed to see I had missed the men's FKT by like 90 seconds. Although my watch tracked the distance as 0.8 miles longer which is odd because I used his gpx file for the route, and the mile markers on my watch correlated well with the mile markers on the trail. Overall a fun route and I look forward to going back when things dry out a bit!