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Hi Brian...Central Michigan huh...I went to Northern Illinois University...believe I attended a fraternity conference at Central Michigan back in like 93/94...if I remember there was a bar called the "warehouse"? Either that, or it was in a huge warehouse and I was enjoying myself too much to care what the name was...excellent time!

Anyway, to your question....you'll get tons of responses here, but it would be much better for us if you could tell us the area(s) you plan to visit while out here...as you are coming in Dec/Jan, you'll encounter snow and cold in the north near the Flagstaff area, but if you'll be in the Phx area, you'll have great weather...in between is Sedona, which will be hit or miss depending on weather patterns...then there's Tucson and the southern areas...

I can think of a dozen or so routes in the various areas...but a bit more info as to your plans would be of help...

Here are a some options for the Phoenix area, if you're visiting other areas, please let us know and we can offer up some other suggestions..

Phx Area - any of the Maricopa County Parks (White Tanks, Usery, McDowell) also Cave Creek, Phx Mountain Preserve is an option, but those just include the parks...you have South Mountain south of Phx with TONS of trails perfect for trailrunning (and entrance is free). Aside from the parks, you have the Tonto National Forest and the Superstition Mountains as options...just down the road is the Globe area likewise with tons of options. Any road in a forest = Forest Road = excellent trail running...you could spend the rest of your life just running the forest roads...

So...if you'd like more info...just ask...

Hey Brian,

You're going to enjoy your training here! I'm going to make the assumption that you'll be in Phoenix for part of your trip and give you my best recommendation for what you're looking for...go to South Mountain. SM is the biggest city park in acreage and has hundreds of trails that all criss cross each other as they wind up and down the peaks. I'm a recreational runner and I do some trail running there (as well as hiking and mtn biking) and it has so much to offer. The trails are wide, the terrain is good, the views are beautiful, and you get to experience desert terrain in a central location. Elevation gains depend on where you go, but they can range from 250' to 1000' depending on the peaks you choose. You can make up any mileage you want by mix and matching trails, but a pretty standard one up to the radio towers on top is roughly 14 miles r/t.

I'll point you to one other source of information you'll be interested in and that's a local running club that I've run with before and they do long distance training runs at SM. They really like it there to build stamina and endurance for their marathons. Contact their president, I know him and they're a super friendly group to run with...Paul would be happy to help you guys out with recommendations.

http://www.eastvalleyrunners.com/training.shtml

Scroll to the bottom of their page and you'll find maps of where they go. A popular one they use is to start at the Pima Canyon entrance, run west on the Ridgeline trail, connect to the Mormon trail, connect to the National trail, go to the radio towers, then turn around a run the entire National trail back to Pima Canyon. I'm guessing it's about 14 miles r/t but Paul can verify for you. Let me know if you need a guide, I can't do 14...but I can do 6!

Enjoy!

South Mountain is probably what you want as the trails are truely mulit-purpose.

The distance from the popular east end Marco de Niza Trailhead to the center Telegraph Pass Trailhead(which is just past the radio towers) is 6.6 miles one-way.

The popular 16.4mi loop is to go from Marco de Niza TH to Telegraph. Take Telegraph Trail down to Desert Classic and return on Desert Classic. Distance is as follows...

Marco de Niza to Telegraph 6.6 (on the National Trail)
Telegraph to Desert Classic 0.75 (on the Telegraph Pass Trail)
Desert Classic to Marco de Niza 9.05 (on the Desert Classic Trail)

Finding the east trailhead is tricky your first time. Directions can be found on this page
http://hikearizona.com/decoder.php?ZTN=306

this is your best option for running without getting frowned upon, it's not a scenic wonderland

How about doing some real training and run the Highline trail every week.