PEAK PUTTERS

Reserving this space for a run report that is likely to include copious amounts of shame, humiliation, and general whimpering

https://www.thetrailhero.com/

See you in a week...

Whew... I'm pooped. Just a tick over 2,000 miles round trip covered in a span of less than 30-hours of actual driving time between Wednesday and Sunday. I'd do it again tomorrow though

So, short story long, the idea of going to Trail Hero was a very last minute thing. My daughter is attending college in St. George, Utah which is a stone's throw from Sand Hollow State Park, the internet mecca of four wheeling right now and location for Trail Hero 2026. Parents Weekend at her college was always on the agenda, but the original plan was to invite a select group of cronies to make the trek with me and do a little self-guided touring of Sand Hollow wheeling in between Parents Weekend activities (think campus tours, community outreach stuff, tailgating, football game, etc etc). Well, good/bad/otherwise I happened to do a Google search for events that might be taking place at Sand Hollow during said weekend, and Trail Hero popped up... As it turns out, this meant that a small group of out-of-towners would be fully gobbled up trying to poke our way around the maze of trails in Sand Hollow, effectively taking the fun out of it. One by one the group of cronies backed out and I was the only one still making the trip. Again, Parents Weekend was always the focal point and any wheeling was just going to be a bonus. After some thought, I decided to take the Jeep anyway and join in on the action at Trail Hero by myself Based on the Parent's Weekend schedule, this meant I was able to partake in a night run on Friday evening and another run on Saturday morning, with some time at the vendor show and rock crawling competition sprinkled in on Friday afternoon prior to the night run. Honestly, it turned out to be just the right amount of time for me in terms of dealing with the crowds and I'm glad there wasn't any further commitment in terms of Trail Hero itself. Been there, done that, literally got the T-shirt

I'll share some photos of the experience here, and maybe try to put a little video together as well. It's impossible to get good video footage by yourself at an event like this, at least of the wheeling, and let's be honest I'm not a videographer in the first place Anyhoodles, onto the pics:

Road Trip:







Vendor Show:











Ran into one of my idols, Shannon Campbell from The Coop Racing and Fabrication https://coopracefab.com/:





Rockcrawling competition:







Night Run 02Oct2026 - Milt's Mile:





The payoff from getting the rock lights installed on the LJ:



Trail Run 03Oct2026 - West Rim:









Overall, the trip was a ton of fun. Parents Weekend and spending time with the female minion was fantastic, and Trail Hero turned out to be a great experience as well. Admittedly my first couple of trips to Sand Hollow weren't all that great, but as I mentioned after both trips, with the right vehicle it could be a whole different ball game. Turns out, the LJ was the right vehicle

Awesome. Parents weekend and wheeling.

I spied your rig pulling in for some local top tier petrol when finishing fueling the wife's car. Was wondering where you were off to this time.