West Virginia Mountain Trail Runners

A beautiful weekend at Seneca Rocks. This is the annual WVMTR weekend of running on the North Fork Mountain Trail.

The North Fork Mountain Trail is a 24 mile trail. The only trail access, except for the ends is an old, winding, firetower road around mile 12. This is the only place for food and water access, so you need to plan your water and food carefully.

I got to Seneca Rocks early, the first tent set up, and I ran over to Seneca Rocks, and ran to the top.

Ok, I ran a little bit. I ran the flats on the switchbacks, and then until I ran out of air on the climb. And I ran by all the other walkers. But I did run the whole section down!

We had a smaller crowd than last year for the run. This led to less car switches at both the start, middle, and end of the run.

Bill Young didn’t show up until the start; and I believe he stayed for the first snap of the camera, but then he was down the trail like a shot!

I was one of the first 10 runners up the trail, but that changed pretty quickly. I was feeling very good about the run; North Fork MTN 06 was my first trail run in WV and I really did not know what to expect. Today, I felt great, had been on both the first section and second section of the trail, and was going to run the entire length. Weather conditions could not be better-low humidity and temps-maybe reaching the high 70’s, a change from former years!

I thought I was the last runner out there, until I stopped for a bathroom break, and Tony and Juli Hooks passed me, and then I caught back up to them and we ran together for a short while.

Hopefully everyone stopped for  a short time at all the scenic views. The next two below is from the first half, next to the hang-glider ramp:

So hopefully everyone stopped for this look!

I got to the 1/2 point in three hours, which I fully expected. I refilled water bottles quickly and told Gene who was behind me (actually a few more than I expected.) Then I headed off for the second half.

The long downhill seemed more like 2 miles than one mile downhill, and I cheered myself up by thinking I now had less than 10 miles to the finish! It seemed like I then was off at every mile marker on this second half, although I had just ran it the year before.

It seemed like a long portion of the 2nd half is run on the side of the ridge. Then, all of a sudden, you are now on top of the ridge, and it’s so very cool because if you look off to your left or right, you can see mountains on either side. The ridge is only about twenty feet wide or so here.

There is a trail here. Really.

Oh yeah, see here’s the trail!!

I kept waiting for the scenic overlook where we took pictures at last year. I finally found it, about three miles from the end of the trail.

Just after this nice scenic outlook, the long descent begins, through the rocks. This is where Amy and Mike, from VHTRC, overtook me. They had finished the 24 miles, then ran up a dirt road, up the mountain, and was working on a smaller loop for more mileage. They bounded over the rocks like..bunnies? I’m not sure. I got a very small look as they ran off ahead.

I hit the shale part of the trail and endured its interminable switchbacks. At this point, I was only looking forward to getting some water in me, since it had been at least 1 hour since I had last swallowed some. It seemed to go on forever, this down hill, but I finally hit the last little incline, and with a whoop! I was done!!

There were the last two runners before me, Rick and Marti, and then Amy and Mike, and Mike’s wife Nancy, still there. Tony Hooks was also lounging behind the wheel of the van and I asked him “so who’s still out there?” expecting to hear I was last in.

To my surprise, he said “Juli” his wife. I was floored. Juli, who’s not run anything longer than 8 miles in training, and that I fully expected to stop at mile 12, was still out there. Good for her! I was very proud of her. This was a big step and alot of mileage for her to bite off. This took alot of determination.

At 4pm, Tony went back up the trail to look for Juli. I made him take water with him, because I knew she would be out of water.

About 430 pm, two hikers and dog came off the trail. They immediately stopped to talk to me, because I had passed them up on the trail. They had not seen Juli, but had come across Tony on the trail. They also had only gone on the trail about 4 miles or so before hiking back out again. I thanked them for their info. I was planning on going up the trail too about 5pm, if Tony and Juli were not back. I knew the WVTR gang would come looking for us eventually if the van never returned. I was only concerned at this point, not worried-unless of course, Juli had turned an ankle out there on the trail.

About 15 minutes later, Juli and Tony come off the trail! Juli looks great!! She looks like she’s been out for a 5K run. She’s more concerned about how TJ (her 11 year old son) has done out on the run-TJ ran the full 24 miles-than herself! She doesn’t even feel or look bad! I’m so proud of Juli! It’s like a future ultra runner here in the works!!

Tony drives us all back to the campgrounds, where the festivities are only beginning. I devour a hotdog and some lentil salad (Marty, that was great!) and some beer as I started chatting with others to see how their runs went.

With the North Fork Mountain Run being just a fun run, it takes the pressure of runners to run for time. As usual, some new folks came up and did their first mountain trail run of 12 miles. It’s a great run to experience some good technical trails. More food and goodies were brought out to devour, and I did, (as Adam also said) “devoured more food than a 24 mile run”. But it was all good. I had a wonderful time, chatting with some new friends around the campfire. The next morning, as we cleaned up, it looks like many of the WVMTR will be working at the Aid Stations at Cheat Mt. Madness–so I will see you all soon!!

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