Hello Saturday Runners!
Starting this week, on October 13, our meeting time will be shifting one hour later to 8:00 am, where it will remain until next summer. Enjoy the extra hour of sleep! Right on cue, this week should bring the coolest Saturday morning of the season so far, with a chance of showers in the morning as well.
Our route this week will be out & back on the Mt. Vernon Trail (downloads: cue sheet and GPS) for a recommended distance of 14 miles, though you can easily alter this to suit your own needs. Since this is an out & back route, you can turn around at any point after reaching half of your target distance for the day. The turn-around point for 14 miles (at 7 miles out) is near the railroad crossing just before coming into the center of Old Town. If you're going for 15 miles or more, continue through Old Town on Union Street, and pick up the Mt. Vernon Trail again when the street ends just before the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.
Remember that we will now no longer have organized mid-run drink stations until next summer, so please be sure to carry your own water if you need it. You can look for water fountains that may be located along any week's route using its interactive map. Select the "OpenCycle" map overlay type from among the available options (map, satellite, etc.), and zoom in a few steps until you can see blue faucet icons located around the map, which are public water fountains. Not all of these are guaranteed to be functional at any given time though (particularly in winter), so do carry water if it's important to you.
Thank you Abbey Gibson for providing this week's post-run drinks! I've now posted the upcoming route and distance schedule to bridge the gap between summer and winter marathon training blocks, so five more weeks of volunteer coverage are now needed starting after next week. Please let me know if you can volunteer for any or all of these days! The weekly schedule of volunteers, routes, and distances is always kept up-to-date on the SLR web page, and you can email me any time to book your slot. For general info on how volunteering works see the SLR FAQ or send me an email if you have any other specific questions.
Happy running,
Mike
