Fighting Creek Loop

Fighting Creek Gap
Great Smoky Mountains National Park
24.5 miles  ~ 4,500ft elevation gain    3hr56min
3/29/11

Monday consisted of mild aches and a uh "disruption" of my stomach function. I woke up Tuesday feeling some better, but still thinking I should probably just rest and recover. This thought soon evaporated as Tuesday appeared to be the only quality weather day of the week. So I decided to convince whatever stomach critter I had that my body was a terrible place to live by hitting the trails for my weekly long trail run.

It's no double ascent of LeConte, but still a bruiser

Ran the loop counter-clockwise, beginning with Laurel Falls Trail

I'd hoped to get on trail before the mobs began walking up to Laurel Falls, but 9:45 was not an early enough start time and I had to share the trail with at least 30-40 people between the parking lot and falls. Fortunately the pavement ends past the falls, as do the crowds. 

In the first 3.1 miles, you gain just over 1,300ft in elevation. It makes for a pretty sorry 5k time, it took me about 36min to hit the Little Greenbrier Trail.

Headed downhill after a rough first 3 miles

Looking into the Little River Gorge from Little Greenbrier Trail

The run down to Metcalf Bottoms was smooth sailing, 4.5 miles of well graded downhill and good footing. Cruising through this section was a reminder of why I spend so much time running trails.

I spent a little too much time playing photographer (which happened all day), but still hit Metcalf Bottoms in an 1hr 15min. The fun momentarily stopped here as I had another steady climb to put behind me on the Curry Mtn. Trail.

Hanging a left onto the Meigs Mtn Trail

While running on Meigs Mtn I may have discovered a new form of cross-training. I spent a lot of my time on this trail running a few hundred yards and then dropping to ground to photograph the abundance of wildflowers along the trail (after about two hours of running this is not easy).

Rue Anemone

Trout Lilies

When I wasn't on the ground taking photos, I must have been moving along pretty well. I hit the Huskey Gap Trail, roughly the 19 mile mark in 3hr 7min. A little bit quicker than I had anticipated. My plan was to try and pick up the pace for the last 5 miles, but I just kept getting sidetracked.

White Trillium

Finally I did get down to business, running the last 5.5 miles or so in 49 minutes. The pace for the entire run came out to about 9:40 min/mile, way ahead of what I though I would do for this route. I'm definitely glad I decided to hit the trail today, maybe I convinced this stomach bug to hit the trail as well.