We all have our "secret weapons" in training. Maybe it's a particular workout you do. Or a person you regularly abuse in training—someone who may or may not benefit from training with you, but you certainly get the good end of training with him or her.

If there is one sort of workout that I just keep coming back to, it's the one I'm going to write about today. It's for strength, for endurance, for physiology, for toughness, but most of all, it's for my brain. It's my therapy. It's what I do when I'm coming back from illness, or off-time, or if I'm just in a bad patch. Whatever ails me, this is as likely to fix it as anything.

When I lived in North San Diego County those close to me would shake their heads when I'd leave on a Saturday morning in my truck and not return for six or seven hours. All to do a 2-hour run. I had a trail system just behind my house that would be the envy of most people. And yet that didn't scratch the itch that I'd sometimes get.

The typical ascent for me is about five miles up, maybe a couple of tenths more, and it'll take me just under and hour (up to an hour and a quarter, depending on the trail and how hard I run it). Each of the four trails I'll write about is this length, and they each climb right at 2000 feet in elevation. I don't know why they're all the same length and ascend the same amount, they just do.

These ascents work for me because the entire round trip is around two hours on average, but it's a lot more interesting to me than a two-hour flat run. It's also easier on my legs. "How's that?" you might ask. It's because I go up slowly, taking small steps, with a quick cadence, and though it's done at a fairly high intensity (even when I'm going "slow") it's not a lot of pounding on the legs. Then, coming down, I again go slowly, with quick, short steps. I'm not trying to achieve anything on the way down, except to get down. Yet the act of running down, which for me is so slow it takes almost the same time as the ascent, still puts a load on my legs and toughens them up.

I wrote about something like this a few years ago in High Places. I wrote about one run that I would regularly do, in which I'd ascend Nate Harrison Grade (the dirt way up Mount Palomar), which would climb almost 3000 feet in six or seven miles. I just love this kind of run. But my favorite versions are those which climb single track trails. I've got several of these climbs spread around Southern California, and when I find myself in the neighborhood I try to reacquaint myself with one of my "old friends," which these trails are to me.

This is not meant to be an exhaustive list of SoCal ascents. Just a list of my favorites, which might whet your appetite to find your own single track ascents.

SPITLER PEAK TRAIL

This was the first of these trails I "discovered," and it remains arguably the most scenic. I would not hesitate to drive two hours each way to do this run, though it was more typical for me to go up the night before, take a shorter, easy afternoon run, camp out, and then hit it in the morning.

There is a sparsely traveled road called the "Pines to Palms Highway," and it's that stretch of Highway 74 that goes from Hemet to Palm Springs. This highway actually starts in San Juan Capistrano, but the stretch of #74 that goes from Capo to Lake Elsinore is nothing you'd want to do in a car. If you're coming from Hemet, you'll go past the turnoff to Idylwild and continue for several miles. Just before the turnoff to Lake Hemet you'll see Hurkey Creek Campground on the left, with Apple Canyon Road adjacent to it. Five or so miles up Apple Canyon will take you to the Spitler Peak trailhead.

As is the case with three of the four trails I'll write about today, the Spitler Peak Trail will take you up to the Pacific Crest Trail. The trailhead sits at 5000 feet above sea level, and when it hits the PCT you'll have achieved 7000 feet. You'll be on a sharp ridge at that point, perhaps 10 or 15 feet wide. Look westward and you can see to the ocean on a day with Santa Ana winds. Turn 180 degrees and look straight down, and you'll see Palm Springs beneath you.

Ascending Spitler Peak Trail is also an interesting exercise in botany. Within the first mile you'll run through a dense thicket of "red shank," also known as ribbonwood, a very hard, deep red wood that is akin to manzanita. For the next mile or so you'll run under scattered Coulter Pines, Southern California's foothill pine that has the distinction of bearing the biggest cones of any pine tree in the world. After 20 or so minutes of running you'll hit your first canopied forest, one of three or four as you run in and out of ravines, most of which have a seasonal brook running through them. These forests variously are made of interior live oaks, incense cedars, white firs, then finally black oaks and jeffrey pines, as the elevation increases.

DRIPPING SPRINGS

This trail is only 15 minutes out of Temecula, and from my ex-home in North San Diego County I could get to this trailhead in 45 minutes. You'll take I-15 to Temecula, and then take the Highway 79 turnoff. As you leave town the road becomes rural, 2-lane, and windy. Shortly afterward, however, you'll see the Dripping Springs National Forest station on the right, and here's where the trail starts.

This is a drier trail, because it is lower in elevation. It starts at 1700 feet above sea level, and it runs as high as you want to go. You can't do it all in a day. But there is a horse camp at about 3700 feet, and that's where I'd run.

The vegetation does improve as you climb, and this is one of my favorite aspects of these kinds of runs. You might start in the desert and run up into the forest. In 60 minutes you spectate the abrupt changes in Nature's personality, starting with hardscrabble, parched ground, where everything alive is scratching out a humble existence. At a higher elevation the brown changes to green in fits and starts. Finally you end up where the living is easy and growth is thick and tall. Is the uphill struggle to achieve a more fruitfull eventuality a metaphor that resonates with me? Is that why I like it? I don't know. Maybe I just want to get from someplace hot to someplace temperate.

In the case of Dripping Springs, you are in sparse chapparel when you start, and while there is both a left and a right hand fork to this trail, I always veer right. This is because the left-hand fork only gains half the elevation over 5 miles, and there is a lot of poison oak on that trail, the avoidance of which requires a bit more concentration. The right-hand fork climbs in earnest, has no poison oak, and gets me where I want to be—into the thin air—more quickly.

After climbing this trail for about 45 minutes you mount a summit, over a small pass, and you end up in a verdant glen you can't see from below. It has a Shangri-La feel to it. It's good for the eyes and for the brain.

There's a second ascent, in which you move past large, old and gnarly manzanitas, and some live oaks and a few Coulters. Then you drop into a second glen, and within a minute of an easy descent you hit the horse camp. This is my turnaround. But you could continue if you were hardy and willing.

SOUTH FORK CAMPGROUND

These next two trails start from the same spot, the South Fork Campground, the "South Fork" representing that particular fork of Big Rock Creek. This fork, pictured below, runs all year round, and after a particularly vicious late-Winter storm can grow as big and frothy as a healthy river.

You get to the South Fork Campground by driving around the San Gabriel Mountains to the west or east, via I-14 or I-15 respectively. In either direction, you'll want to end up on #138 (the Pearblossom Highway) and you'll drive uphill into the mountains after you hit the town of Pearblossom. This campground would be gained by driving one hour from Ontario, or one hour from Burbank.

Besides being remote, wooded, scenic, next to the creek, with bathroom facilities, and free (except for a Forest Adventure Pass), trails leave this campground in three directions. I'll write about two of them today, but a third is the trail I run most often. But it's not a 5.2 mile ascent, as the other two are. It's a 45-minute round-trip run from one creek to another. This run, plus the two I'll write about below, might constitute a nice weekend's worth of running.—the short run on the Punchbowl trail on Friday evening, then one ascent on each weekend day. You'll be back for dinner at the in-laws Sunday afternoon.

MANZANITA TRAIL

This mostly-wooded trail is variable, and climbs and descends during its entire route. At the end, you'll have climbed from 4500 feet to 6500', though the entire gross vertical will have cost you a bit more. You'll find a lot of interesting geology on this trail, as the surface on which you run changes color dramatically, as does the vegetation growing on it. You'll end at Vincent Gap, a point on the PCT, and a trailhead in its own right. Not counting the east and west routes of the Angeles Crest Highway, trails leave in seven different directions from Vincent Gap. Were you of a mind to continue on one of these trails, you'd ascent four more miles to the top of Mount Baden Powell, at which point you'd be standing 9400 feet above sea level.

The Manzanita Trail wan't an easy one to build, as there are a fair number of wooden fences holding back the detritus falling as a result of Winter snowmelt. The trail in the image above runs in between the upper and lower fences.

SOUTH FORK TRAIL

Of all the trails featured here, this is the most severe, in a way. No, it doesn't climb any more steeply than the others, or gain more eventual elevation, but it is notched into the side of the ravine that this creek rived between two 8500' mountains. The gorge is steep, and for the first 20 minutes there are several places where a misstep would result in a free fall of 200 feet and more. Therefore, I don't recommend taking a dog with you unless you've got very good voice command of it. I've taken Charlee up there a couple of times, but I get nervous every time I do, because she's a varmint chaser, and I still haven't decided how much sense she has.

This means I don't run this one too often, because Charlee is my running partner (that's her on the Manzanita trail earlier today). Still, I've been up it a half-dozen times and it's one of my favorites.

This ascent never does anything but ascend (as ascents do). That is to say, there are no breaks, no variation to the pitch. It's not overly steep, it's just constant. It hits both the Pacific Crest Trail and the Angeles Crest Highway at Islip Saddle. The Angeles Crest is closed every Winter, and we'll know when it's open for bike riding because the two road closures are Vincent Gap and Islip Saddle—so when I run one of these ascents I check to see if the gates are still blocking the road. I suppose one very intrepid runner might want to attempt the loop, connecting the South Fork Trail with the Manzanita Trail via running the (closed in Winter and, this year, the entire Spring, and therefore car-less) Angeles Crest Highway. That might make the entire loop 20 miles or so. Dawson Saddle, at 7900 feet above sea level, is situated between these two passes, so one would want to consider that before attempting it.

FOREST ADVENTURE PASS

In all these areas which reside in National Forests—specifically the Cleveland, Angeles, San Bernardino, and Los Padres—one $30 annual pass gets you access. You can buy these Forest Adventure Passes at Sports Chalet—that's where I get mine—as well as a lot of other outlets.

DON'T DRINK THE WATER

At each of these climbs mentioned above, with the exception of Dripping Springs, there seasonal and permanent springs and streams. On the Manzanita and South Fork trails, for example, there are two or three along the way, so Charlee has a lot of aid stations at her disposal. This is important, since dogs are much more prone to overheating than humans, and require more water during runs.

But you ought not to drink from these streams, because quite a few are inhabited by Giardia Lamblia, and nasty little bug that will play heck with your digestive tract.

FIND YOUR OWN

On the little map I've included—which expands to all of Southern California if you click it—I've put in green those areas in which single track ascents are likely to be found. I've listed four, but there are probably four times four, or times forty. I just haven't investigated them all. Also "green" on my map are the Santa Ana Mountains, and I seem to remember running an ascent or two that would terminate at the top of Saddleback Peak, at over 5000 feet in elevation. Then there are the Santa Monica Mountains—just West of L.A.—thoroughly unexplored by me except on a bicycle (the roads I have explored, and it remains one of my favorite riding spots).

In San Diego's East County there are the Lagunas, with several mountains over 6000 feet in elevation. One such run I like starts at the Paso Picacho Campground, and in just about six miles gets you to the top of Cuyamaca Peak, and in that span carries you from 4600' above the sea to 6500', mostly under black oaks, sugar pines, cedars and other various conifers.

You don't live in Southern California? There is not a state west of the Great Plains that doesn't have mountains within a two-hour drive of wherever you might live. Do you live in Georgia? The mountains start in Dahlonega and don't stop until you hit Ohio. Are you in the Carolinas? Go west. If you're in Florida I can't help you.

You see my point. Most of you can find an ascent within a couple hours of you, and the exploration and discovery of them is almost as good as the running. Ferret out trail maps, topo maps, maps of national forests, of state parks. You'll find yourself poring over them.
I do have one caution. Running these ascents gets into your blood. It mutates your genes. After your mountain runs you'll find it hard to come home and, one day, you won't. I speak from experience.