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