Notes
Mostly cloudy, not too hot but really humid. Ran the Riverlands trails by myself. Plan was to try and find the Bradford hill trail. Went out on the Homestead trail to start. Trails were wet from the rain last night. Deer flies were out in force, although not too bad on the single track. Hit the Ridge trail next. Started getting pretty hot my this time and struggled on the hills. Took my hat off which helped, but then the flies were all over my head. Walked a lot of the steep climbs. Made it out to the ATV road and stopped for a second to look at the signs and the flies were swarming like black flies. Every time I clapped my hands above my head, I killed at least one or two. Took off to the south, then took a right on what should have been the Bradford Trail, but it wasn't marked as such. Stopped to let 3 ATV's go by. There were lots of water holes on this ATV trail. Saw no sign of the hiking trail I was looking for. Decided to turn around at 5 miles. Hit 5 miles at a trail intersection. To the left was a snowmobile trail with a No Trespassing sign. To the right was the continuation of the Bradford trail. Abby texted me and I was dripping wet all over my phone and the flies were so bad I couldn't text back so had to call her. Picked up the pace on the way back to try and keep the flies at a minimum. Went back the same way. Flies weren't so bad in the woods. Still feeling hot, and starting to get thirsty, even though I had some Tailwind left in my pack. Once I got back to the picnic area, I waded out into the river to cool off, but it was just like bath water. Tried to run fairly hard the last mile back to the car. Ran out of Tailwind at the car and was really thirsty. The humidity and flies were brutal. Felt pretty good given the conditions. Really thirsty when I got home.
This was my first run with Tailwind, I felt like I had plenty of energy and I didn't cramp at all, but I could have used an additional water source because of how much I sweat in the humidity.