I had been training for my first 100 miler and since it was cancelled a few friends from Complete Runner Ultra supported me to run the Virtual Hennepin 100.
On Saturday, September 26 at 7:08 AM I started the 100 mile journey by a bench on the Rochester River Walk next to the Rochester Library. I connected to the Paint Creek Trail and ran North until Clarkston Road, taking that West to connect to the Polly Ann Trail. I ran South to get to the start of the trail at Joslyn Road. I took a picture of my watch at this point and it was 9:41 am. From there I ran the Polly Ann Trail North all the way past the rock pile at Kings Mill, then turned around and ran the trail all the way South to complete the round trip of the Polly Ann. I then ran back up the Polly Ann to Clarkston Road and took that East to connect back to the Paint Creek Trail then south to finish up where I started the day earlier at the Rochester Library.
Antonio was in charge of logistics and aid. He met me every 5-10 miles with nutrition including Tailwind, UCan Bars, trail mix, almond butter and banana sandwiches, watermelon, and a Chipotle burrito. I ran alone from the start to mile 20 and from miles 40 to 55, but had one or multiple pacers the remaining miles including all through the night. People would run a section with me then Antonio would take them back to their cars and then go ahead and meet me at the next point on the trail. The support was absolutely incredible and I was grateful for everyone who came out to help logistically or share miles on the trail with me.
I completed the entire 100 miles in 23:18:15. From looking at my time stamped picture of my watch at the beginning of the Polly Ann Trail and following the times on Garmin Connect* I completed the Polly Ann Trail round trip in 17:31:37 in the middle of my 100 mile run.
*Calculations: I started the Polly Ann trail at the elapsed time of 2:34:03 into my 100 mile run, and finished back at that same spot round trip at the total time of 20:05:40. Subtracting these times gave me the total round trip time to run the Polly Ann Trail.