The day was a long one. I got up early, drove north through Colrain to Bennnigton and made it to mile 5 of the Shires of Vermont Marathon. I'd actually planned to shoot at mile 4 but got stuck in a line of traffic that had formed (ironically) due to the marathon. Lesson learned: get up even earlier.
After taking photos of runners in that race, I zipped south down Route 7 to Adams, MA where I parked and set up near the finish of the half-marathon route. Over the course of the next hour and a half or so I moved up and down a half mile stretch of the Ashuwillticook Rail Trail. I caught the lead runners near the crossing of Main Street, moved north to catch a few near CJ's Pub, then back south a bit, and finally ended up at the finish line to catch the last few coming through. In the end I got photos of nearly everyone (missing only the occasional occluded runner in a large pack), and as I said before they came out great. I'm very happy with the results.
When it was all over and the awards were starting (along with the light rain that would continue for much of the afternoon), I set out for my own run. I went up the rail trail to Cheshire, and then got off onto the Appalachian Trail and ran up to Cheshire Cobbles where there was a spectacular view out across the valley towards Mt. Greylock. I managed to run the entire way up, which easily took about twice as long as the very fun descent.
On the way back to Amherst I drove through Savoy, a town I can't wait to get back to later in the summer for the trail race there. All in all a long, exhausting, and very rewarding day of running in the Berkshires.
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