Even as season changes, Central Oregon trail runners have myriad options

Published 10:00 pm Saturday, October 24, 2020

As snow begins to fall in the Central Oregon Cascades every autumn, local trail runners are forced to stick to lower-elevation areas.

But trail running is a year-round sport on the High Desert, and runners do not have to venture far to find ideal routes throughout the fall and into the winter.

“That’s one of the beauties of Central Oregon,” says Lucas Alberg, author of “Trail Running Bend and Central Oregon.” “It really is great running year-round. If you get a little snow in the foothills, all you have to do is look out east and you can go to places like Maston, or Dry River Canyon, or the Radlands (all in the Redmond area). Just a couple hundred feet of elevation change can make a big difference with snow. And all that stuff is within a half-hour drive.”

Alberg’s book, released in 2016 by Wilderness Press, includes 50 loop options for trail running, all of them within 65 miles of Bend. The routes range from 3 to 17 miles and average about 6 to 8 miles, and all are targeted to the typical trail runner.

But as Alberg, 41, and most Bend runners have figured out, trails can often be accessed out their front door. Bend’s urban trail system offers endless opportunities for loops and out-and-back runs of varying distances.

“Wherever you live in Bend, you’ve got access pretty close, within a mile or two, to a trail or a trail system,” says longtime professional runner Max King, of Bend. “The river trail going north from town, south from town. The Canal Trail, Larkspur (southeast Bend), Pilot Butte if you want some hills, Awbrey Butte for hills …”

Both Alberg, a public relations manager for Hydro Flask who says he runs about 40 miles per week, and King, who runs up to 90 miles per week, make the Bend trails part of their daily routines.

King, 40, likes the Deschutes River Trail. Alberg likes the trails on the southern end of Shevlin Park.

“Ever since the book has been written, there’s been new trails that have popped up, especially in town,” Alberg says. “The Riley Ranch Preserve is a great example of that.”

Riley Ranch, in northwest Bend, has some trails near the Deschutes River that runners can use to venture all the way to Tumalo State Park.

“That’s a great one,” Alberg says. “And it never gets super crowded.”

Alberg adds that Bend’s park system offers many miles of trails, including some in Pine Nursery Park and Rock Ridge Park in northeast Bend.

On the west side, trails surrounding Shevlin Park make for good running routes.

“Most of the new trails in Shevlin are converted forest roads, but there is some singletrack, too,” Alberg says. “You can make some nice loops out there without having to go too deep into Shevlin proper. That’s a great place for dogs, too, because it is more open and less people.”

King says that the trails on the west side of Bend typically remain snow-free through November and sometimes well into December. But when they do become covered in snow, he heads east of Bend to places like Horse Butte or Horse Ridge.

“As we start to get more moisture, it’s nice to hit some of the trails on the east side that generally during the summer are pretty sandy,” King says. “They firm up this time of year, which is nice, and they get more runnable.”

A longtime Bend resident, King adds that over the years he has had to get a bit creative to stay on dirt as he runs west of Bend where many developments have been built. Trails have been built along with them, but many of the trails are paved paths rather than the more forgiving dirt that trail runners seek.

“The developers don’t quite get the idea of having dirt instead of pavement,” King says. “They do a good job linking it with paved trails, but not leaving the dirt trails.”

Before the Northwest Crossing neighborhood was built on Bend’s west edge, the area was crawling with dirt trails. Similar trails remain, just farther out as the Bend city limits spread westward.

“They have the Highland Trail in there, but it still seems like it’s getting farther and farther out,” King says.

The Tetherow neighborhood in southwest Bend has built more trails and connectors for trail runners and mountain bikers, including a dirt singletrack trail that circumnavigates the entire development.

“That’s something different that you don’t have to drive out to,” Alberg says.