Yonah Race?

On Saturday April 14th I, along with a few running buddies held the first ever and hopefully annual Yonah Race at Mt. Yonah in Cleveland GA.  The trail is about 4.5 miles round trip with just over 1500ft. of gain.  Yonah is one of my favorite mountains and training spots around and I was happy to share it with some friends as it is easily accessible and offers good technical trail running.  We decided to hold this pseudo race to have a larger selection of people that have run the trail in order to post a fastest known time, however since the race I still can't bring myself to go post it.  I guess I still want to see more people run it and have a larger collaboration of times on the trail first.  On the flip-side if I put it out there more people may find out about it and go run it.  Maybe I'll decide to post it by the end of this blog but we will have to see.

We had a great time running the mountain and in the end I set a new personal best time on both the ascent and descent.  I still think I could find another 45 seconds to a min. on the ascent but am not sure I could get much on the descent.  I'm sure someone else could and would love to see a lot of people try this trail.  Recently I found a trail that connects Yonah Mtn. to Pink Mtn. next door.  With this new trail there is easily 10 miles of trail within 5 min of downtown Cleveland that would have roughly 2500 ft. of vert.  Great trails with great views, go run it.  Keep an eye out for the next Yonah race next spring around Easter time.  Just not on Easter because we will be celebrating the payment made by Jesus for our sins when He died on the cross and three days later rose from the grave.  He did this so that anyone who calls on His name will be born again to live forever in Heaven with him.  Pretty sweet deal.