Trail Flow: Changing Terrain

There are different levels of awareness and concentration depending on many factors when trail running (or any activity for that matter) but it mostly depends on the kind of terrain, the weather, and what the weather does to the terrain. Some of the kinds of trail terrain that come to mind are:

- Carriage road
- Dirt road
- Uncleared dirt road
- Snowmobile/ATV trail
- dirt base single-track
- dirt base single-track with rocks and roots
- technical

Of those, technical is the most vague. What I mean by a technical trail is a trail that has so many rocks, roots, or cliffs, or whatever -- that footing is a significant challenge. Choosing your line over the terrain and deciding where you'll place each foot is an important part of flowing over the trail, and that's what makes trail running such fun. Why would that make it fun is hard to explain, but trail runners either know what I'm talking about or they prefer easier trails, where accurate footing is not as important.

The last few runs I've thought about the difference between running primarily on the tops of the rocks in very technical sections, and running primarily on the dirt between the rocks. Switching between the those two distinct methods made me realize they are optimizing different things. When there are fewer rocks, you run on the trail and avoid the rocks, moving and lifting your feet out of the way of passing rocks. When there are too many rocks, you come to a point when you realize that you can run on the tops of the rocks much more efficiently, even if it temporarily expends more energy. Because small movements affect your balance easily when you're moving faster, you can easily adjust your foot placements in the most time-efficient way. So it often makes sense to speed up somewhat for technical sections, instead of slowing significantly to pick your way through or over the obstacles. If you slow, your balance becomes more heavily invested in foot placements, making it harder ironically.

Now that I'm running on pretty technical trails most of the time, I find that I now have 3 distinct trail running modes. First is the low awareness smoother trail mode, where I'm a little more aware than when running on roads and watch my footing a little. Second, there is the higher awareness rough trail mode, where I'm still trying to optimize my flow and footing for controlled speed and efficiency. After many years of running in this mode, I can instinctively catch a bad foot placement to avoid a turned ankle. Last is the focused awareness challenge mode, where I'm scouting my line ahead and placing my feet as precisely as within one inch in order to step on certain rocks or ledges without slowing down. This is the mode where you expend more energy to make progress in a more time efficient way, for example taking much longer and out-of-line strides at times to best cover the ground. If the rocks are right it can be a lot of fun, kind of like dancing on rocks.

Switching the mode of running for a new terrain context is something I never thought about until I ran these trails with extremely technical sections more frequently. Rough trail mode is so automatic for me that it took a while to just really focus on rocks and only rocks sometimes, which takes me into that next challenge mode. The stakes are much higher in challenge mode, and I've been lucky in the past. If you trip at the wrong time when you're running a little faster over very technical stuff, you can fall pretty hard: I once tripped and flew about 10 feet forward and 3 feet down chest-planted onto some rocks while running up at Giant Ledge in the Catskills. I lay there for probably 10 minutes before I was sure nothing was broken. Considering all my years of orienteering and trail running, that remains my worst fall.

When I switch from smooth-trail mode to rough-trail mode, where I flip on my reflexes for counteracting ankle-threatening foot-plants, it's like I shift into a different and more focused state of mind. It keeps parts of both the conscious and unconscious minds busy, and can become a kind of meditation, but one with action that can be entertaining at the same time. When you up the notch and flip the switch to challenge mode, it takes even more focus, and can be even more fun. I get so carried away with running on the rocks sometimes that instead of running on the trail again after it smooths out a little, I just run alongside the trail on any rocks I can find. But for racing I will have to optimize switching back and forth between those modes of focus.