One of my goals this year ended up taking most of the year to complete. Pat learned that the North Country Trail Association offered a patch and a certificate for anyone who covered 100 miles of the trail in a calendar year. We had plans to cover some of the trail in adventure/training/race runs and so filling in the other miles seemed like a cake walk. Of course in the end we had to put in some extra work to get the hundo.
The North Country “Trail”
You’ve heard of the Appalachian Trail and the Pacific Crest Trail. Well, the North Country Trail is the Midwest’s attempt to be like those other trails. Kind of like how Meijer is the Midwest’s attempt to be a good grocery store. Neither one totally hits the mark.
The North Country Trail (NCT) is still amazing in many ways. It’s actually the longest trail system in the US, stretching over 4,800 miles from North Dakota to Vermont. 550 of those miles are in da UP. And 600 more are in the lower peninsula. This makes Michigan the bell of the ball as it should be with some amazing sections of trail that Patrick and I have enjoyed in previous years like parts of the Jordan River Pathway loop near Bellaire and the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore Trail along Lake Superior.
But there are also a couple of reasons why this ain’t no Appalachian trail. First of all, it’s unfinished. Local trail associations do their best to acquire and create new sections of trail and to maintain their areas. Much of the trail is not trail at all but runs along dirt (or even paved) roads. Wilderness sections end up not having complete trails as well because they are hard to maintain. Patrick and I have spent enough time searching for the trademark blue blaze of the NCT on a tree to learn that when you can’t find the trail, it’s because there almost isn’t one. Look in the area you’d least like to run through (downed trees, rock piles, swamps, etc…) and sure enough you’ll find the next blue blaze and be able to stay on the “trail”. The second reason that the NCT is no Appalachian trail is because it goes through Ohio.
2021 On The Run
Looking back on our NCT 100 is a great way to look back on a 2021 that was often spent on the run. Patrick hit 2,000 miles for the year and I came really close to hitting 2,000 for the second year in a row. Our miles on the NCT were only 5% of our total miles but they were some of the most memorable.
One of our earliest training runs was a new-to-us section called the Warner Creek Pathway which was an excuse to go take a Friday off and go to Short’s. It was so fun flying down some windy sections of the icy trail. This is also where Pat learned what I thought everyone already knew: The origins of the phrase, “Wutt in blue blazes!” Of course it comes from the first trail to be marked with blue blazes, the Western Undulating Tennessee Trail (W.U.T.T.).
One of the most epic runs of the year was our 34 mile steeplechase (and black fly chased) run through the Porcupine Mountain Wilderness State Park. Part of our loop and some of the waterfall treks we made before and after the big run helped us add some random miles. In the summer we started to realize that getting 100 miles on a trail that always required at least an hour drive to get to a trailhead wouldn’t be as easy as it seemed. (Coincidently, my whole ultrarunning deal could be summed up with the phrase “wouldn’t be as easy as it seemed.”) Pat ran some NCT miles in Ohio (the sacrifices we make!) and I experienced a beautiful and terrible ultramarathon of NCT miles along the Two Hearted River. We finished our NCT journey together in early November with 18 miles west of Hastings, MI in Barry county, talking about how grateful we were for a great year of running. We both agreed that the highlight of the year was the Marquette 50 mile ultra that nabbed us 16 miles of breathtaking (in all the ways) NCT in mid-August.
What I’d Do For A Sticker Or A Patch
We filled out an online form and got our patches and certificates in the mail. Here’s the thing: I have no use for a patch. I don’t know what to put it on so I just have it in my office. This begs the question: Why? George Mallory infamously responded, “Because it’s there.” But he died on the North Face of Everest.
Here’s a better answer: The patch (or the sticker or the T-shirt) give you something tangible to hold onto for an intangible goal. Last Sunday in my sermon, I talked about how having an actual gift card of hope might help us to be more hopeful (hope is super-underrated.) I think the goal of getting a silly physical object in exchange for epic physical exertion is similar. It’s hard to wrap my mind around the real rewards for running long distances. Things like improved health, getting to see beautiful sections of my favorite state, getting to be with great friends, getting to connect with God along the way, and all the learning and awe that comes from doing hard things – that’s all hard to quantify. It’s easier to just go after a useless patch.
Once you’ve put all of the above into an adventure or a race or a challenge, the patch becomes so much more. For me, it will be a reminder that even though life in 2021 was pretty tough in general, I did some difficult things with a great friend on purpose that make the overall impression of the year pretty great. The NCT 100 was no Everest, but I’m looking forward to not having to care about logging NCT miles anymore and to taking on whatever adventures lie ahead in 2022.
The big one on the horizon is Marji Gesick. “The Barkley of the UP.” Pat and I signed up for the 50 (62) miler that will be in September. One of the things we fleshed out on our last NCT run was an ethos that we even gave a hashtag: #winmarji. Win Marji doesn’t mean we’ll actually win the race. Certainly, just finishing will be a great accomplishment. But it means that over the next 9 months we won’t just do some long runs off of a random training plan. We’ll try to do all the things it would take to actually win the Marji. We’ll try to compete, not just complete. The only thing we can’t control is our actual athletic ceiling and the abilities of our competitors. But the things we can control (training, strength training, mobility, nutrition, etc…) are going to get our best efforts. The hopeful result is that we’ll feel like we won Marji no matter the actual result.
The training for that race has already begun and there are plans being hatched to run great miles in some great places that will surely have us once again chasing the blue blazes of the NCT in the year to come and beyond.
MI Trail Challenge 