Planned on a trip back to Burlington to do the big loop on all the variations of Tunxis Trails.  When I ran this with Wuzzam, the Old Goat and the Hillbilly, it measured out at 17.5-miles and took us 4:37 moving time and 4:58 total time (including stops, pictures, etc).

Today was damp with temperatures in the mid-forties.  The dried leaves seemed to be much tougher on the uphill and downhill sections today compared to my memory of them a month ago.  Some of that may have been due to me running harder/faster.

I thought that if I ran well, I could break 4-hrs.  I'd have to average roughly 4.5-mph to do so.

I felt great at the start, despite managing a hilly four-hour run with Wuzzam on Thursday.  The only bothersome issue was I never really got above 4.7-mph once the initial couple miles were finished.  On the other hand, I only dipped down to a 4.5-mph average after the "mile of ledges", which just seemed impossible to run hard through.

As I made my way through, especially the section prior to and into the Fish Hatchery, I felt strong.  I was sitting at 4.7-mph, and didn't think I felt a "blow-up" coming on.

The damp and cold began to bother my leg turnover a bit, but I caught a break just prior to "Devil's Kitchen", and as my report of losing the race-course trail a week or two ago made sense as I noticed the trail we had done in October has been re-routed.  There were a couple of drops and climbs prior, but now the trail climbs and sticks to a set contour (the new trail hasn't been bench-cut fully, and with the dry leaves everywhere it ended up slow going but at least it doesn't loose all your gained elevation twice to get to the same spot).

Made it down out of the "Kitchen" and sooner than later the route opened up onto the wider old forest roads to the finish at the Cemetery.  New distance recorded at 17.03-miles, so the re-route knocks a half-mile off the old route.  My finish times were 3:38 moving, and an additional 1:18 stopped time, so a rough guess of 3:40 for the day (4.7-mph).

I think in the spring or early summer, with no leaves to make things as difficult, I might just be able to drop under 3:30...  we'll see.