Rockin K Trail Runs

Kanopolis State Park – Kansas

April 5, 2003

The Rockin K trail run is composed of a series of loop trails in the Kanopolis State Park with a 5 mile out and back to Mushroom Rock State Park on sand road. These are mostly horse and mountain bike trails, all single track. Most of the trail system is on U.S. Army Corps Of Engineers land. This is potential high water area for the lake. Since the topography is deceptively hilly, the public land follows the canyons and watersheds well away from the lake. For much of the race the lake is not in sight. The fifth annual, 2003 version included a new trail loop, “Big Bluffs” which was included when we were denied approval, by the Wildlife Department, on our permit application for part of the existing trail system. The Parks department let me have this area as an exchange for the lost trail loop. John Peppiatt first ran the “Big Bluffs” section, a collection of interconnected game trails. I have to blame him totally for putting the idea of using this trail in my mind. Bill Shirk and John helped me connect the game trails and do brush hog work, making runnable trail where none existed before. Due to the changes, this years edition included a couple of beaver bog crossings. After the new trail was whacked out, it was GPS’ed to 28.05 miles for the marathon and 50.66 miles for the fifty miler.

In the week prior to the run I was wondering if I needed to order I.V. bags, with the temps in the 90’s. A cold front rolled in the night before and dropped the race day start to the mid 30’s with daytime highs of about 50 degrees and overcast with little wind. There are full aid stations at the start/50 mile turnaround and at gate #6 and one unmanned aid station. The Gate 6 aid station is passed 3 times as the runners complete 3 different sections of trail and the unmanned aid station is set up at an intersection of trails so it is passed twice, once each on the out and back.

Marc Friesen took the lead in the 50-mile race, and the lead of the whole pack, never looking back. He led the second runner by about 8 minutes at the turn around for the second loop. The second runner was Wil Punt, the marathon winner! Marc was about 20 minutes up on the second fifty-mile runner at the start of the second loop. He finished in 8:05:40 to win the overall. Randy Albrecht passed Adam Chase in the last 8-mile section to take second in 9:12:37. Stephanie Schwartz ran easily to finish in 9:43:40. Stephanie also led all of the women into the second loop turnaround, almost every year we have had the 50 mile winners leading all of the runners at the marathon finish/fifty mile turnaround. In the marathon race, Wil Punt built a five-minute lead on Jonathon Beverly for the win in 4:05:58. The womens marathon race was not decided until after the first twenty miles. Four women were within seven minutes of each other going into the last nine-mile home stretch. Kay Mathias pulled ahead and finished in 6:02:26, just 11 minutes ahead of the second woman, Nancy Dalrymple.

Phil Sheridan RD