Hey Kent...you've got a trail to run.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

My daughter Heidi, like me, loves to ride her bike. This is partially motivated by the fact that she has never gotten her driver’s license. She’s 21. Anyway, she has the same ability to have tires constantly going flat…or something else going wrong mechanically. Today…it was the seat.

“Dad…can you bring an allen wrench when you come to pick me up tonight? Eric says you can fix the seat with one of those…whatever they are,” she said.

She is doing a summer intern with her Godfather – the same Eric I’ve noted for his running prowess. She takes a bus from Kent to Akron, then rides her bike from Akron to his office on Rt. 18, about 11 miles, on the days she needs to be there. I had a meeting with Eric and would be taking her home that evening…saving her about 2 hours of travel time. For that, I was getting dinner and an evening with my daughter. Good deal for me.

The seat was an easy fix…I’m so mechanical. I had been thinking that I would be trying a run in the dark later that evening, but decided there might be a better way.

“Want to go for a run with me before dinner?”

Heidi never hesitated. “Nah. I just want to take it easy. I did ride to Eric’s this morning, you know.”

She didn’t mind my going though, but had no idea where I might find trails on which to run. I’m pretty paranoid about running on pavement since I’ve been healthy and can run whenever I want now. We did some google searching and I noticed the Mogadore Reservoir just south of Kent. No trails were showing, but it was a big body of water and part of the Akron water system, which I knew meant the grounds around the water would be restricted use and nothing would be there. Maybe I’d find an access road, I thought, or at least run country roads instead of the streets around Kent.

“You don’t realize just how good you have it with the Cleveland Metroparks until you get away from Cleveland and try to find something like our trails on which to run,” I said.

Heidi has done some traveling and couldn’t agree more. We are truly blessed with them. I would suppose that you could live anywhere in Greater Cleveland and never be more than 15 minutes from one of the parks and outstanding trails to run. I’m spoiled.

I found the Reservoir and it looked promising. There was an access road for fishing off of Rt. 43 and once I parked and started running it, discovered that it became more of a hiking trail. I had been thinking I would be happy with a 30-minute run, but as I ran along the water’s edge and saw that the trail appeared to be staying with the water, felt that I should keep going so as to be able to accurately report on its length, topography, and serenity. Purely a selfless, exploratory expedition.

I found myself running across the top of an earthen dam about a quarter mile long. From this perch, I could run and look over the Reservoir, appreciating its size (huge – technical term for really, really big) and beauty. I spooked up a couple of Great Blue Herron as I ran and noted that it would make an excellent kayak destination.

I ran the trail for an hour and in that time passed only a half dozen people. There was some residential property abutting the trail, but sparse. I did stop a fellow runner and was informed that the trail, though not encircling the entire reservoir, did go for an 8-mile stretch, or so.

“I didn’t see any signs indicating it was here,” I said.

“Yeah…they don’t seem to promote it much,” she said.

What a shame. It’s only 8 miles south of Kent – a no-brainer for a dedicated trail runner or hiker, and it really is serene. So…running friends from Kent…you do have a place to go.

Run duration: 60 minutes.

Training Heart Rate: 140.

Calories burned during workout: 1050.