Plan B: Case Mtn.

The original plan for today was to run the Northern Nipmuck Trail Race (16 miles). However, due to my ailing hip, I had been wavering on wether or not to actually do the race. I was unsure on how much I could actually run and also feared getting caught up in a race environment and pushing myself too hard and causing some further damage. Also, Mark was looking to head down to NJ and the 10:00 race start time didn’t suit his travel plans (and he’s been nursing an injured ankle.) So we both decided on bagging out and going out for our own trail run earlier in the morning. This way I could take it easy and test my hip and do whatever distance I could handle and Mark could be done at a better time to get on the road. It was a bummer to not support a local race but it was a decision best suited for our situations. A friend pointed out to us “Don’t jeopardize the bigger plans” which is in reference to our first 100-miler attempt this summer. Absolutely true!

So Mark and I met up at 7 AM at Case Mountain and put in a 14 mile run at a controlled pace. We explored a bit and made it around the reservoir, an area that we had only mountain biked to in the past.


My hip felt surprisingly a lot better than I anticipated. The time off my feet is slowly allowing me to recover. The pain peaked on the downhills when I had to absorb the most impact, but it was manageable. I rolled my ankle towards the end of the run and wasn’t thrilled about that. Oh well, sh#t happens. I was happy to get in almost 3 hours on the trails and hopefully my hip didn’t take too much abuse. Post run assessment of the hip was positive: Things didn’t feel too bad! It seems to be a bit of a rollercoaster for me lately. In the past week, I attempted two runs and could hardly move and had to hobble back to my starting point, but today I could manage a steady run with a respectable distance. I’m looking forward to physical therapy on the hip in a few days.

Gear note: Mark’s Inov-8 Roclite 285s saw their first significant mileage today. Mark reported that they were indeed light, had great traction (which was key with the slick trail today), and no blistering or hot spots were experienced. A solid thumbs up rating!


I’m hoping to break out my new Inov-8 Roclite 318 GTXs soon and am looking forward to getting them dirty!

After the run I retraced the first section of the trail to snap a few pics. Also, here's a link to a couple of Buckingham Reservoir pics which we ran around this morning.