Road Trippin'

I was out in Bristol Virginia this past Saturday for a Salomon Shoe Demo/Trail Run put on by my friend Jennifer. I had not been out to the Bristol area before and as I am always looking for new places to run trail, this was a great excuse to hit the road!

  I drove out to Virginia on Friday, in some serious rain! Once I got into Va. from North Carolina the weather cleared up and by 4pm I was sitting at the hotel looking at a clear blue sky. I went into town to check things out and find the park where we would be running the next day. Jennifer had already marked the trail, so I ended up exploring about a mile of the six mile course. I had forgotten how much Virginians love their long ascents!  The trail was nice and muddy and looked like it was going to be fun to run on  and a great testing ground for trail shoes!

  Saturday morning I got up and headed to the park to meet Jennifer and help set up. The run was starting at 10am and it was going to be quite humid. The Salomon rep was there and I was going to be trying out a pair of the SpeedCross 3, which had what Jennifer described as a "Gnarly" tread, which would be great to test along the rolling, muddy single trail sections of the trail.
  The trail was awesome! Some great hills with nice downhill sections to bomb down. The SpeedCross gave me plenty of traction and felt super comfortable. Here is some video of me running along the single track section:



After the run we went back to the Mountain Sports Store for refreshments and food. It was awesome to meet the local trail runners and talk about the upcoming Iron Mountain  50 miler I will be running on Labor day weekend in Damascus, Va.!
 I got home early evening on Saturday, after a much more uneventful ride home. I was rather impressed with the Salomon  Speedcross 3, so I gave in and got myself a pair!