My Utah road trip: trail running and gravel riding in the mountains

This was a challenging ride. Sand flats is a misnomer, since it starts with a steep climb (at first on the road) and then the road continues to climb to about 8,000ft all on gravel.



Depending on the time of year the washboards can be bad and the sand can get a bit deep. In early March those two weren… read more

The White Rim Trail that circumnavigates Island Mesa in Canyonlands National Park is an iconic road. I wanted to ride the Shafer switchbacks as an out and back to get to the start of the White Rim Trail. These switchbacks are super steep, in a couple miles you descend 1,500 feet, and the grades range… read more

This is a great loop, linking the Hidden Valley Trail (a real gem of a route) to the Moab Rim Trail (tracing the Moab Rim), all the way over the the Stair Master Trail, dropping down to the Kane Creek Boulevard with sweeping views of the Colorado river.



To close the loop you link up to the Pipe Dream… read more

We started this route from downtown Salt Lake City, Utah, running up into the snowy mountains. There's a great trail balcony system with sweeping views of the Wasatch!

The single track around Virgin, Utah is next level! There was some smooth buttery sections on this route and some sandy pump tracks too, as well as some great techy sections for practicing bike handling skills. Great views, awesome single track. Bikes are fun!

This was an exquisite backcountry adventure in Zion National Park. This route is backcountry and off trail, going south into the park where people seldom go.



There aren't trails in this part of the park, so we had to find our way scrambling on sandstone (difficult) and across mesas and much navigation… read more

Normally this is a mountain bike route, but it makes for a fun trail running route too! It requires some focus because it is technical, but in a fun and playful way. This trail twists and turns and rolls up and down across the hurricane rim.

Fun, flowing and a little techy single track on the Jem Trail. This is typically a mountain biking trail, but it's fun to run too!

This is an awesome ride on the west side of Zion National Park. The first climb on the gravel road is super steep, but there are amazing views of the park and the mountains to the west. A really stellar ride with sweeping views from every point in the ride. Check out the red dirt roads that are iconic in this area too.

Here I found a great steep, quiet gravel road outside St. George. This road would be tricky if there was rain, and there were some major ruts from dried mud, but it made for an interesting ride! Certainly some testing steep climbs here.

This island is magical! It's located on the Great Salt Lake and it feels like you're running in a desert on on Mars.



There are bison there that you can run next to (from a safe distance) and pronghorn antelope to see as well. It has spectacular views of the great Wasatch Mountains and a great perceptive of how big the lake is.

Another iconic peak accessible right from the town of Salt Lake City! Mount Olympus is a bit more epic, and very steep and a bit technical at the top. With the snowy conditions, it made the final summit scramble a bit spicy.

Trying to do all the vertical feet I can while on my road trip. The west ridge of Grandeur Peak is direct and I like it! Two more laps today, 2,000m!

Grandeur Peak is accessible right from Salt Lake City, Utah. The west side, which I did four laps on today, climbs 1,000m in about 3.5km. Pretty awesome.

This was a perfect recovery day hike. I love to hike in Arches National Park because there's so much to see and I don't want to miss the beautiful landscape.



This hike is at the very back of the park, but I think it has the best views of all the hikes.

This route is great for practicing bike handling skills and a bit of technical terrain. There is not a lot of up and down but there is a lot of slick rock (Moab's specialty), and a bit of technical terrain to keep things interesting.



There's also some fun, smooth, single track to put a smile on your… read more

A super great hike. Linking Hidden Valley (starting from the Hidden Valley trailhead) across Hidden Valley and then up to the Moab Rim with great perspective of the Spanish Valley and Moab.