Running in Winston-Salem, NC - A Primer

Winston's got more than just tobacco

When I got the call that I'd be working in Winston-Salem from March 2011 to March 2012, I couldn't be more excited. As a native of Charlotte, a 10 year resident of Raleigh, and a frequent visitor to the Wilmington and Asheville areas, the Triad was one locale I had yet to explore. As I get older and travel more and more, I feel like a seasoned ambassador of North Carolina, and this stop in "The Dash" was a memorable one.

Similar to what I wrote about after my stint in Greenville, NC and my many miles at Umstead Park, here's a small look into what I've picked up on in the past year and what is worth checking out if you ever venture to what was once known as the "Tobacco Capital of the World."

Tracks
Hanes Park - 775 West End Blvd
This is a place that every town needs. A nice, public rubberized track. You don't have to worry about getting kicked off. You may have to dodge the Reynold High Track team practicing, but they usually stay out of lane one. There's also a nice ~1.25 mile loop around the park that is great for a warm up and cool down. It's right across the street from the YMCA and many group runs start and end here as well. Another plus is that there are tennis courts in the middle of the track that are lit until 8pm or so, which makes night time workouts a possibility (sans head lamp).

Wake Forest University - 499 Deacon Blvd (Kentner Stadium)
A beautiful track that is a little softer and nicer than Hanes Park and is easily accessible. The gate is always open, but try to be respectful if the Wake Forest teams are practicing. The track is adjacent to the cross country trails, which makes for a perfect 2 mile warm up and cool down to sandwich a workout.

Trails
Salem Lake - 1001 Salem Lake Rd
One of the treasures of the Winston running scene is Salem Lake. It's a few miles off exit 195 of Highway 40 and is a nice 7 mile crushed gravel loop that plays host to the Salem Lake Trail Runs (30k and 7 mile). One piece of advice I can give is if you come after work, park in the top lot before the gate, as they tend to lock said gate before the announced times, and I've seen multiple cars get locked in. Otherwise, enjoy the trails and watch out for the mountain bikers!

Reynolda Gardens - 2201 Reynolda Rd
Very close to the Wake Forest campus are the beautiful Reynolda Gardens. There's a nice ~1.5 mile loop that can be configured multiple ways and it's perfect for an easy day. You can park at Reynolda Village and sit outside and grab a bite at the Village Tavern afterwards.

Wake Forest Cross Country course - 499 Deacon Blvd
I first ran the trails at Wake in high school, competing at the Wake Forest Invitational, and they are exactly as I remembered. The full loop only takes about 10 minutes or so, but you can weave through the multiple options and add it on to the Reynolda Gardens run, which is located about a mile away. They have recently filled in the many eroded areas of the course for better footing.

Thinking of buying near Winston? I can help!

Running Club
Twin City Track Club
The thirty five year old club puts on many races in town and has multiple groups that get together for runs as well. They have a nice link for local runs (with distances), that you can often find members of the club running during the week. They put on the excellent Beat the Heat 5k, Ultimate Runner and Frosty 50, that are listed below, as well as many, many other events.

Running Stores
Fleet Feet Sports - 50 Miller St
Since the closing of 4 Runners Only, Fleet Feet is the only show in town. Conveniently located right across the street from Whole Foods and Yoforia, Fleet Feet has all of your running specialty store needs and a nice staff that will put you in the right shoe.

Omega Sports - 414 S. Stratford Rd
A favorite of mine since my early days in Charlotte, Omega is a great place to catch a deal, as they always have coupons (join their email list). A nice staff and a nice selection make it a great place to pick up a pair of shoes or some gear.

Popular Races
Beat the Heat 5k
This is the NC USATF 5k Championship and is an overall awesome race. I ran this in 2010, before knowing I'd spend a year here, and raved about it then. Any race that has free beer, free pizza and free subs post race is good in my book. A challenging course and great competition makes it worth the trip. They also do an interesting "age-graded" award system, which is becoming more generous to me as I get older. It's also held at night, which is a nice change of pace, especially in the Summer!

Ultimate Runner
One of my favorite running events, period. And I've only done it once. It's a decathlon of sorts where you run the mile, the 400, the 800, the 100 and then close it out with a 5k tour of Hanes Park. It's limited to 108 runners, which are divided into 8 heats. You're given points for your place in each event and like golf, low score wins. The event is followed by an awesome after-party, put on by Twin City TC, that includes free beer and pizza. A must do!

Mistletoe Run
A staple in Winston is the Mistletoe Run, which is a Half Marathon. The race starts by Hanes Park and offers some challenging hills and a very scenic course. It's generally held after Thanksgiving, during the first weekend of December and there is a 5k and Fun Run option if you're not looking to go the 13.1.

Frosty 50
I've yet to run this one, but my sources unanimously recommended it (and they're natives). The Frosty 50 is a 50k that's held around the first Saturday of the year at Salem Lake. Don't want to run a 50k? There's a 25k option and a 4-man relay as well.

Post Run Fueling
Foothills Brewing - 638 West 4th St
Like beer? Me too. Not only does Foothills make award winning beer, they have an excellent brewpub where you can get cheese grits as a side item. They also have trivia, music and plenty of TV's to watch sporting events. And if you're anywhere in NC, order a Hoppyum or a Sexual Chocolate (if you can find it). You won't be dissapointed.

Mozelle's - 878 West 4th St
My favorite restaurant in Winston. If you can only go to one place to eat, this is the spot. Great apps and entrees and a nice setting near downtown Winston makes this a hot spot. Try the gourmet bacon-wrapped meatloaf with cheese grits (yes, I love grits) and spicy collards. Delicious!

Krankies Coffee - 211 East 3rd St
A very cool coffee spot that I was only introduced to recently. They've got a great vibe here with plenty of indoor and outdoor seating. Food, coffee, beer. You know, the works.

Other Places Worth Checking Out - Old Staley's, Single Brothers, Skippy's Hot Dogs, Tate's

Other Things of Note
"Running Shorts" blog
Eddie Wooten writes an excellent blog for the Greensboro News & Record that covers the running scene throughout the Triad. A definite bookmark for keeping up to date with local races and news about local athletes performing on the national level.

JDL Fast Track - 2505 Empire Dr
Winston's first indoor track opened this year. Local builder and excellent runner, Craig Longhurst, has mixed business with pleasure and developed a spot to host high school. college and even masters meets. This has filled a big void in the state, as last year there wasn't a place to host the high school state meet. Thanks Craig!

Aperture Cinema - 311 West 4th St
An excellent movie theater that shows the films that will be nominated for Oscars. Also, the host of the River Run Film Festival. A great place to see a film before a night on the town, as it's located right on the heart of 4th Street. Also, they serve beer and wine.

Pilot Mountain Pay Back
If you're into Ultras and mountain running, Pilot Mountain is just a short drive from Winston and hosts this excellent event. They also have the Pilot Mountain 5k Challenge if you don't want to go long.

Krispy Kreme and Texas Pete
Two of Winston-Salem's finest exports!

Future Additions
This was orginally posted in March 2012. My hope is that when people google "Running in Winston-Salem, NC," that they will find this post, so if there are any additions I am missing, or things change in the future, please email me and I will revise accordingly!

Thanks to Brian Amrich, Nick Iauco and Molly Nunn for help compiling the information! And thanks to the good people at Wake Forest Baptist Health for providing an excellent place to work!

Follow writing about running on Twitter and Facebook

Thanks to our sponsor, Race Ready, for sponsoring the blog this week.Great running shorts to store your PowerBar gels! If you're interested in sponsoring writing about running (and other great sites like TrackFocus, Track Superfan, Paul Merca and the House of Run podcast) in the future, check out The Relay Network. 

Hobby Jogging: 9/18/11 - Raleigh, NC - The Magnificent Mile

With the last three weeks of my training being 24.5 miles, 17.5 miles and 16.5 miles, I wasn't expecting much today at The Magnificent Mile. The past eight months in general have been a drag due to severe shin splints. When will it end? Hopefully soon. Anyways, enough with the sob stories. The Mag Mile is a great race and as much as I knew today would not be a PR day, or anything close to it for that matter, I still wanted to hop in. How often do you get a chance to run a mile road race?

The Mag Mile also serves as the USATF State Road Mile Championship and is the first race of the Second Empire Grand-Prix Fall series. Maybe my shins will heal miraculously and I'll be ready to run strong the rest of the series. Hey, stranger things have happened!

Warming up the "kick"

Got in a good two mile jog of the course (forwards and in reverse) with John Simons beforehand and did some hard strides. I was as ready as I was gonna be. After announcing what seemed like half the field, we were off. The legs were moving, just not that fast. I got out good, but spent the entire race reeling people in. When I circled the capital and hit the halfway mark in 2:35-6, I thought the A-goal of 5:10 was within reason, but when I hit the 3/4 of the way marker in 3:58, I figured that was likely out of the picture. My legs just weren't ready to run that pace. I kicked home the last 400 as best as I could and saved one more sprint in the last 50 yards, to pass a local high schooler, to finish in 5:16, 4 seconds faster than my B-goal of 5:20.

What can I take from the race? Reassurance that it takes consistent training to perform and a good rust busting performance. Nothing exciting, but a good way to go through the motions of a pre-race warmup and all the things that come with that. Hopefully that'll help in the near future!

Charlie's Angels 2, Full Throttle

My friends and teammates faired great and it was fun to watch. John was a bit up on me in 5:03 (1 second off my 5:02 from 2009), Joe had a big breakthrough in 5:38 (20 seconds faster than he ran in '09) and Erin came in an impressive sixth overall in the Women's race in 5:23. All star blogger, Shelby Van Pelt, ran a strong 6:00 as well (although I know she wanted that 5:59). Performance of the day went to my friend from Winston, Molly Nunn, who ran 5:19 for fourth, one day after winning the Run for Green Half Marathon in Davidson, NC, as she prepares for the Wineglass Marathon (and an attempt at the Olympic Trials Qualifying Standard of 2:46:00).

After the races, we all got together and did a nice three mile cool down through Raleigh. The shins felt better here. Hopefully a sign of what's to come! Until then, it's run when I can, soccer on Tuesday and hopefully get to Winston early enough tomorrow to register for the Boston Marathon!

Also, congrats go out to The Athlete's Foot Racing's Joe Moore, who won in 4:20 and to TAF-ers on the road, Bobby Mack (14:03) and Sandy Roberts (14:13), who finished sixth and eleventh respectively at the USATF Road 5k National Championships in Providence, RI.

Follow writing about running on Twitter and Facebook

Hobby Jogging: 8/27/11 - Laurel Springs, NC - Continental Divide Trail Race

This past week marked year number two of my now  annual training trip to Boone, NC. Last year I did most of my runs with my buddy from Charlotte, Scott Williams, who was living in Boone for grad school. This year, my friend from Greenville, Tyler Pake, who just started a blog, came along for the ride. The trip was awesome. After spending the last year battling hamstring issues (and the last 6 months with shin issues), it felt great to get in some real training (after lots of small mileage weeks and biking). We got into town Monday and hit Moses Cone Park for the first run. An easy 6.5 miler and then dinner at Black Cat Burrito got the week off to a good start. The next morning was a nice solo 5 miler at none other than Price Lake. That afternoon, the goal was to tackle Fire Tower.

Good single track at Price Lake

Well, Fire Tower didn't happen, as we missed the turn at the Cone Manor and ended up on the Watkin Road loop. We got down to Bass Lake with 6.25 miles done and decided to regroup and try again in the AM. That night, we hit up Boone Saloon for the famous Taco Tuesday. $1.25 Tacos and $4.50 pitchers had the place packed wall to wall. Had a good, cheap dinner and a pitcher before retreating back to my favorite hotel in Boone, the Super 8 (cheap, clean, indoor pool, fridge, free wifi, nice employees, free breakfast). 

Wednesday morning we tackled the beast; Fire Tower. For those unfamiliar, Fire Tower is a well known run in Blowing Rock that starts at the bottom of Bass Lake and ends at the top of Flat Top Tower, aka Fire Tower. The run climbs 1000 feet in just 5 miles. The first 2 miles were bad up to Cone Manor, but after going under the Blue Ridge Parkway, it gets difficult. I can happily say that I never stopped to walk; something I can't say about my race Saturday. Once we hit the switchbacks after the field, it was tough. But getting to the top and climbing to the top of the tower was pretty cool. You'll see "PWP '11" scratched into the backside of the lowest level of the tower if you ever make the journey!

Trail Race? More like rock climb

That afternoon, our legs were fried, so an easy 30 minutes at State Farm Fields was all we could handle. We got off on the trails and hit one trail that was called something to the effect of "staircase to heaven." We got halfway up and turned around. The legs were done on hills for the day. Luckily, an awesome dinner outside at the Coyote Kitchen helped us recover for an easy track workout in the morning.

Thursday morning was that easy track workout at "The Rock," App's Football Stadium. Just an easy 4x800 with a lap jog at 5:50 pace or so, then a 200 in 33 and a 400 in 73 where I had to stop dead in my tracks for a passing student. The ASU Jogging class watched us and hoped that we weren't the 8am class and that they'd have to match our workout, albeit a short one.

Thursday afternoon was an easy 4 mile cutdown and some strides at Bass Lake to get the workout out of my legs. Tyler made the trek back to up Cone Manor to get some cool photos. We got some barbecue takeout at Bandana's that night to watch the Panther's game. Friday morning would mark checkout and our last run in Boone. We headed down the mountain to hit Mulberry Creek Road. This is where things got a little weird. The run was just an easy 4 miler that felt great, as we dropped about 1000 feet from the 3500 feet altitude we'd been running at all week. The fun started when we got back to the car and had one of the locals decide to tell us we were on his property. We were parked in a church parking lot.

Continental Divide Trail Race Elevation Change

"I've been putting up with you and your dogs for four years. Yall've been scaring my livestock and if the bull I just paid $1000 for trips and breaks his neck, I'm coming up the road to take it outta ya." He assumed we ran for Zap Fitness, which is located right up the road. The funny thing is, we ran the opposite direction of his farm, and although the roads are gravel, they are public roads. Luckily, no shotguns were pulled and we were on our way. Good thing, as there was no cell phone coverage within miles!

Make it stop

So the plan all week was to go run the Continental Divide Trail Race in Laurel Springs if I made it through without breaking anything. The legs were sore, despite my free massage during the earthquake and I was tired, but the body was holding up. So it was on to Jefferson to stay at Scott's house for the night while he competed across the country at Hood to Coast. And this was the USATF National and State 10k Trail Championship. I'd earned "Hobby Jogger All American" once before (name on USATF website), maybe I could do it again.

To say this race was hard does not do it justice. To say it was brutal is being a little nice. My friend Molly Nunn said is was fun. I guess it was in spots, but overall, not fun (or my idea of fun)! We had to hike up a huge hill just to register. From that point, we knew it was going to be rough. The race started at the top of a mountain and the first 3/4 mile was straight downhill. Breakneck downhill. Back side of the hill at McAlpine Park downhill, but for 3/4 of a mile. What comes down must go up and it did. I walked for the first time before the first mile. Should someone who's had recurring shin and hamstring problems attempt this race, probably not, but most runners, like myself, are sick. This pushed my limits. I almost quit here, but soldiered on.

At about 1.5 miles in, I fell flat on my face. Cut my leg pretty good and scraped my knee, but popped back up, didn't get passed and carried on. At 2 miles we started climbing, and climbing and climbing. Lots of walking here. As I got back to the meadow, I saw Molly getting ready for her race and a casually cursed her. Thank god the third leg was coming up. This is where I started feeling good. Not much walking here and I passed three people. Was the nightmare over yet? Not by a long shot. Navigated the switchbacks until 5 miles or so when the straight up "climb" started. This is where I asked myself "what the heck am I doing here?" Except I didn't use heck. This was crawling on your hands and knees and "walking with your quads clutched" territory. Oh yeah, the wind was blowing hard enough to push you down. I truly felt I may fall off the side of the mountain. These were not good times. After a 15 minute final mile, we see a slow grass uphill. Thank you! Now I'm hoping to turn the corner, then get a good kick into the finish. Well I turned the corner and there was the finish. No room to kick. I crossed the line in 44th in 58:24, for a 10k. Ouch.

Happy Times post race

Very thankful it was over at this point. I didn't feel overly tired, as it was hard to get in a rhythm. I felt more defeated and mad. This wasn't trail running. It was more like mountain navigating. Oh well, great week of training and I did break an hour, my initial goal. Luckily, I've had a week of training since that race and what a feeling. Even though Boone is only 3500 feet above sea level, I've been feeling the effects of coming down with great runs all week.

I'll look forward to the trip again next year and will look forward to possibly another week ending race. Maybe the Maggie Valley Moonlight Race. The Continental Divide Trail Race gave me all I could handle! But who am I kidding, I'll probably be back.

Follow writing about running on Twitter and Facebook