Image in front page article (Nairobi national park?) perfectly illustrates why Americans are slow

ilive CO wrote:

yeah. wrote:

The US is a big place. You should get out more if you have never seen a dirt road like this. Plenty of these in Colorado if the requirement is altitude.

In Colorado, roads like this have high amounts of traffic from SUVs and others, if they access any private land with houses on it.

On public land, you have noisy, fast and polluting ATVs, side by sides and dirt motorcycles ripping up and down these types of roads. Most people in the US also own cars, and like to drive them around just for fun.

Odds are in the winter roads like this in CO are covered with snow and ice.

Its not just the roads though. Its partially the motivation. Every guy in this photo is training hard in order to improve their life situation.

In the SF bay area those roads are reserved for hikers, runners, equestrians and bikers. OSPs. Many of them are foot traffic only (no bikes or horses). Never any snow or ice on these trails.

Flounder wrote:

Swag Surfer wrote:

They also have the unfair advantage of having lions, hyenas, rhinos, etc. to run from. It's life or death for them, poverty or not.

If you run from those wild animals, they will chase you, they will catch you and they will eat you.

It is safer to stand your ground against a big cat. I have experienced that in Colorado with a mountain lion during an early morning trail run. In the US we also have bears, which I have encountered on trail runs in New Jersey, Texas and Montana.

I saw my first taxidermy mountain lion at a NM ranger’s station when I was buying a state park pass to run in the mountains after moving there some years ago. It was off to buy grizzly spray straight from there. It was some years before I actually saw a live one (plus a few bears), and luckily NOT while out on a run, but yeah, all of the folks up thread who think we’re an all urban, overly paved country, get on insertyourstate.gov and see what’s outside of your beltway. I’ve lived in 6 states so far, in cities with population ranging from 200K to 8M, and have never been without miles of dirt trails to run. Just do your homework before opining.

ilive CO wrote:

In Colorado, roads like this have high amounts of traffic from SUVs and others, if they access any private land with houses on it.

On public land, you have noisy, fast and polluting ATVs, side by sides and dirt motorcycles ripping up and down these types of roads. Most people in the US also own cars, and like to drive them around just for fun.

Odds are in the winter roads like this in CO are covered with snow and ice.

Its not just the roads though. Its partially the motivation. Every guy in this photo is training hard in order to improve their life situation.

Funny you should mention motivation. I’ve lived in the CO Rockies. Twice. Always found mountains to run in. Year round. There’s this thing called winter gear for runners, which god created specifically for those scary snow and ice conditions. A pair of gaiters and some thigh deep powder sure slows you down, but it won’t hurt your spring performance levels one bit.

Ciro wrote:

Texas for some reasons... wrote:

Can’t say Texas has much altitude, but hundreds of challenging dirt roads here for sure. Never mind it being August, super hot in the afternoons and humid basically all the time.

Where in Texas has dirt roads like that?

Take your pick. It’s a big state. Alamo City Ultra starts in about 40 hours, for one.

I’ve been living in TX part time for a year now and I got some great trail suggestions when I reached out right here on letsrun. If you google Texas trail running your top two hits are great resources.

Now the weather out here does suck. I’m from the Mountain West originally and there were Texas days this month I thought about trading my running addiction for something less deadly like smoking.

pdx wrote:

Ciro wrote:

Where in Portland?

Moving there soon.

Forest Park. If you want a gravel rd, Leif Erikson Dr runs 11 mi through the park and is only open to non-motorized. Then there is the 30 mi Wildwood trail loop which is very hilly. Enjoy

Wildwood looks good, but Leif Erikson seems very rocky to me and not great for running at all. That said I only saw about 2 miles of it.

Thanks for the advice.

trails are us wrote:

Ciro wrote:

Where in Texas has dirt roads like that?

Take your pick. It’s a big state. Alamo City Ultra starts in about 40 hours, for one.

I’ve been living in TX part time for a year now and I got some great trail suggestions when I reached out right here on letsrun. If you google Texas trail running your top two hits are great resources.

Now the weather out here does suck. I’m from the Mountain West originally and there were Texas days this month I thought about trading my running addiction for something less deadly like smoking.

Thanks, ha ha.......I definitely hear you.