Another great run directed by James Varner from Rain Shadow Running. Kelly and I signed up a couple weeks ago, knowing it would be a bit of a suffer-fest because neither one of us has done any significant running since the Beacon Rock 50k almost two months ago.

But it was too good to resist and yesterday finally rolled around.  Set in the North Cascades in the Chelan Sawtooth Sub Range/Methow Valley, the 50k (there were actually a few bonus miles in the mix) course had 9,000 feet of total gain stretched across a bit of everything: shady woods, patches of snow, open alpine meadows, rocky passes, and acres of  wild flowers.

We took our time, literally stopping to smell the flowers. It was hot and dusty and a suffer-fest for the last 14 miles or so, but views and thoughts of dinner at the Twisp River Pub took a lot of the pain away. We shuffled in to the finish with smiles on our faces.

Some selected pictures are below, a full set of pictures can be found at: https://picasaweb.google.com/wolpin/2011AngelSStaircase50kRun

Kelly getting above tree line

Alpine lake

Dappled sun

Crazy bridges

Park service workers fixing crazy bridges (thanks!)