Friday, April 20, 2007

My Mountain



One of my New Haven interval training staples is East Rock Park, which is a two-minute ride from my house and consists of a one-mile gradual uphill (to the monument) on a winding access road often closed to traffic. It's a mini-Alp, with - laugh your hearts out - a maximum elevation of 359 feet! As with training anywhere, you use what you have. The 425-acre park was designed by Fredrick Law Olmsted, designer of Central Park and many others, in realizing a vision of urban areas "bejeweled" with green space. (My teammate Leigh Valetti is an urban planner who is an expert on matters of Olmsted, so I hope to rack her brain in Georgia next weekend...) Here's a 19th-century painting (by William Ekgel) of the park, as well as a photo of the access road.

1 comment:

John Forrest Tomlinson said...

In the 1980s Yale hosted a collegiate race on a circuit in the park -- basically all climbing and descending. It was fun but somewhat hectic.