Today was the sixth event in the Northwest Trail Runs Winter Trail Series, the Interlaken Icicle Dash held at the very small Interlaken Park in Seattle.   I’d only run through the road portion of this park in the Seattle Marathon before, I had no idea there were trails there.   As usual I got there early to do registration which got a little crazy for a time, there were about 300 runners total today which was more than I had expected.

The course was short, 2.5k per lap which meant 2 laps for the 5k and 4 for the 10k.   It had an out and back on the closed road trough the park then a fairly steep 200′ single track climb in about 1/3 of a mile going up the hill and an even quicker descent back to the road.   The first lap I finished in about 16 minutes due to being mid-pack at the start and taking a while to break out of it.  On the second lap I did have to walk a bit of the hill but somehow still managed to finish that lap even faster than the first, I crossed the finish at just under 30 minutes,  I forgot to turn my watch off until I was out of the chute at 30:09.  Not bad for a short, crowded route with a decent climb.

One more event left in the series, the Frost Eagle at Soaring Eagle on Feb. 7th.  Today was the 4th event that I’ve run in the series so I got my cool new Northwest Trail Runs hat.  In the series standings I was somehow 26/297 male runners after the last event, I guess just going to a lot of events has its advantages in the standings.   I have been at each event as a volunteer but skipped a couple of the longer events since I wasn’t ready for the distance.  In two weeks I’ll do my first 5 miler since getting sick then I have a month from that until the Redmond Watershed Spring run.   I’m hoping to build up mileage over the next few months to get ready for the Rattlesnake Half in June.  If I’m up to it I may switch from 10k to half at Teanaway in May which is much, much flatter, 1400′ is way less than 2700′.