Perfect day out in the Los Padres. Started just after 8am with a big send off from the wonderful people at the Sisar Canyon Run Club. Got into a solid pace on the fire road section. I carried water and some Gu Chews and Garrett just had a few gels which ended up being more than enough for the whole run.
Hit the trail to White Ledge camp and tried to stay quick but it was a bit tough on the single track. Got out of White Ledge and started the switchbacks up to Nordhoff Ridge. Garrett maintained a steady pace for this section and didn't push it crazy hard because we knew we were way up on time. Got to the ridge and was able to extend the legs a bit which felt really nice. Soon we hit the switchbacks up to the bluff and endured our slowest pace of the whole run. This section was a lot longer than I remember and super punchy. Just had to tuck in and accept the slow pace. We both wore Endorphin Speed 3s, which ended up being a great overall choice, but they suffered here a bit as we were slipping out on some of the loose stuff. We still made good time to the top but didn't spend long there. Garrett took some pictures while I wrote our names in the log book. I think we were less than two minutes up there.
Coming down was a little sketchy on the steep trail so we took it slow. The switchbacks coming down from the ridge were a lot more runnable so we were grooving all the way down. Had some amazing cheers of encouragement as we passed through White Ledge where the run club was chilling, then popped back onto the fire road and cranked the pace down to the finish. Solid effort and a really fun day. Big time soreness after which is always a good feeling. I definitely think with some more specific training sub 2 is easily doable, but for right now we're satisfied with this effort.
Some rough splits:
38 min to White Ledge Camp
59 min to Nordhoff Ridge
64 min to the base of the summit
78 min to the summit
56 min from the summit to the finish