Hi, this is Debbie Boyles, coach at Mojo for Running with podcast number 54, first-time trail racers.

I thought for this podcast I'd share with you an article I wrote from my column in Florida Running and Triathlon magazine.

If you'd like to subscribe to that magazine, just go to their website, and I'll link to that in the show notes.

Trail running is just like road running, except it requires a keen eye, intense concentration,

great agility, more energy, and the mindset that an occasional tumble is unavoidable.

Okay, I'm just kidding. It's really quite, quite different from road running,

but more and more roadrunners are adding it to their running regimen

once they experience the incredible beauty and the challenge of the trails.

From soft sand to tricky knots of roots,

trail running incorporates every imaginable form of terrain. While many

trails are wide, relatively flat, and have few roots, others involve technical stretches of steep

descents, drop-offs, and water crossings. Personally, I've done a few trail races with such steep

descents at some spots that I had to grab a vine and lower myself down the side of the ravine.

And those races were in Florida.

I can imagine that sometimes they're much more challenging in other areas of the world.

Most trail races are somewhere between those two extremes, offering pretty, single-track, shady

trails with the occasional pesky route to hop over.

Perhaps the most noticeable difference between trails and roads is that the ground gives

due to the softer surface, a double-edged sword for sure, because while that's easier on your joints, it also

absorbs a lot of energy, making trail running considerably more strenuous. So why then would

anyone want to do it? Well, I often host trail runs for my local club, and we're often

joined by first-time trail runners.

...