You run: up the birchlined hill, past the mammoth boulder you call ‘The Bench,’ then down the gradual descent toward the marsh bridge, where your footsteps sound hollow on the wooden boards. You think about your breathing, your leg strength, your energy level. You think about your day, the things you have to do, the places you’ll go next.

You think about a lot of things out on the trail, but what you probably don’t think about is just how that trail came to be—the thought and action that led to inception. The person who took that chunk of land surrounding you, figured out its every nuance in shape, altitude, climate, animal, and mineral, and plotted the best path through, up, around, and across it.

That someone may have been John Morton.

If you’ve run at such New England hot spots as Pineland Farms, Thetford Academy, Twin Brooks Recreation Center, or Hyde Park, then you’ve run on Morton Trails. Wait…trail design as a profession? Couldn’t any runner with good sense, a good map, and a pencil sketch out a suitable running course?

You may think trail design is that simple, but Marc Gilbertson, a high school running coach and former Olympic nordic ski racer would let you know differently. Gilbertson is currently teaching and coaching at Lamoille Union High School in Vermont. His team trains at Hyde Park, which features more than ten kilometers of running and ski trails adjacent to the school.

“The first really notable thing about John’s trail design was in how quickly he was able to familiarize himself with our little piece of land,” Gilbertson says. “I’ve been living here for years and messing around on this piece of land, planning trails in my head. John was here for about two hours and had a basic plan in place that became the system. His ability to envision what the trails should be is pretty remarkable.”

The Pineland Farms course in New Gloucester, Maine.

In high school Morton was an avid skier, biathlete, and runner. For most of his life he was heavily involved in biathlon, competing at the 1972 Sapporo and 1976 Innsbruck Olympic Games and attending five more Games in various coaching and officiating roles.

It was after he retired from professional competition that Morton found his new calling. Starting with ski trails, Morton quickly discovered the reward of building running and multi-use trails, and to date there are five notable trails that he has designed either exclusively or primarily for cross-country running. The difference in design between ski and running trails is minor, although Morton notes, “Runners are less enamored with a real steep descent.”

Al Fereshetian, head crosscountry coach for Bates College, has nothing but praise for the home course at Pineland Farms in New Gloucester, Maine. Fereshetian insists that in his thirty years of coaching and traveling he has “not seen any trail networks that provide any better of an experience for runners.”

Fereshetian lists the high mileage of “difficult but very runnable” terrain, well developed drainage, and wide groomed trails as features which make Pineland remarkable. “Our training and race preparations have improved significantly over the last five years since we have begun utilizing this facility consistently,” says Fereshetian.

It may be smooth running now, but Morton admits Pineland was a challenge. He was given the assignment to create a hilly course so that runners from southern Maine could prepare for the steeper terrain they would race in the northern part of the state. The challenge for Morton was that the topography at Pineland was relatively flat.

“It’s just a question of trying to use what’s available,” explains Morton. “I spent quite a bit of time just cruising the land to make sure I knew where the high point of every knoll and little knob was and made sure that, in terms of plugging in the climbs in the loops, that I would make an effort to go from the lowest point that I could reasonably get to, up to the highest point that I could, so that it really maximized the elevation gain.”

John Morton in his office

Jamie Anderson, a three-time racer of the infamous 50-miler that takes place at Pineland Farms every spring, would agree that Morton did his job. “The hills are very roller coaster-like,” Anderson clarifies. “None of the climbs or descents are particularly long, but there are constant ups and downs, so hill training is a must.”

Of course, terrain is just one factor in trail design. For instance, knowing that Pineland would be used as a research farm, Morton had to be cognizant of where the grazing pastures might be placed so that running through and around fences would not be an issue.

Wetlands can be another obstacle when designing a course, something Morton realized when trying to find terrain variation at Twin Brooks Recreation Center in Cumberland, Maine. Morton tries to minimize his footprint on the environment, but points out the dichotomy of the situation by explaining, “On the one hand you’re looking for those elevation changes and you very often need some form of brook, stream, or even just a drainage—yet at the same time you want to be mindful of minimizing the disturbance of any wetlands.”

Rocks can be another double-edged sword in trail design. As Morton points out, “If you can do it skillfully, having ledge outcroppings next to the trail is interesting, and it adds a wonderful visual feature.” If not done in the right way, Morton admits, excavating could prove more than tricky.

Morton does not run an excavator himself, and Morton Trails is solely responsible for the overall trail design, but Morton is involved through the entire process: from flagging the trees needing to be harvested, to coordinating with the loggers and excavation crew during the actual trail construction.

Bogs, thickets, and pests also pose problems—both to trail and trail maker alike. Morton will often use landscape technology before even setting foot in an area, especially if the site is far away. “David is very skillful with the computer and Google Earth,” Morton says, giving a nod to his partner at Morton Trails, David Lindahl. However, if the site lacks topography, it can be hard to get a sense of the terrain via internet technology, and scoping the site by foot becomes a necessity. Morton chuckles painfully, “Ticks are definitely an occupational hazard, now!” Morton recently designed a new running trail next to MEIGS High School in Pomeroy, Ohio, of which he recounts, “I’ve never seen such a variety of thorns, pricker bushes, and vines with thorns on them. That was the thickest, the nastiest stuff I’ve been through!”

Though Morton likes to add his own twist to a trail—reconfiguring the logicality of certain terrain features by adding side-cuts to a natural uphill, for instance— he also designs with a wide audience in mind. Accessibility is important to Morton, and his philosophy of trail design is heavily influenced not only by who will race on it, but also what role the trail will fulfill for the community. “To some degree the terrain dictates what the course is going to be like, but my tendency is to try to, without watering down the experience for the elite athletes, make the trail as accessible to as many people as possible,” Morton explains.

When Morton talks about access, he is not only thinking about the runners. “You know, one of the features that we really work hard to try to incorporate into these trails is improved spectator visibility,” Morton says. “If there are areas for spectating in the vicinity of the start/finish, the trail loops back either through that area or at least adjacent to it, so that people can see the athletes multiple times.”

If you want to talk about maximizing the potential of a trail, Thetford Academy is a good example. Morton was commissioned to help design the trail by Dan Grossman, a Thetford local who was determined to build a trail with real cross country features which could someday host the New England Championships. The state forest land which sat adjacent to the Academy had just been blazed with several new access roads, and Morton was given permission to use a combination of these roads, which he connected together using various features of the surrounding terrain.

The Thetford course has been used for numerous cross country meets over the years, including the New England and Vermont State Championships.

Morton is excited about the potential for his next project, a biathlon trail in Mammoth Lakes, California, which he believes will also be utilized by the running community. Mammoth Lakes is well-known as a high-altitude running center, home to such athletes as Ryan Hall and Deena Kastor.

Morton is not limited to designing public courses. He has found a need for building private trails for individuals and families who are, as Morton explains, “interested in having better, more enjoyable access to their own property.” A number of these private trails are commissioned by retirees who have purchased a large chunk of farmland and end up cutting a trail in conjunction with the process of thinning the trees around their property.

Seeing people active in the outdoors is what makes Morton happy. As a former racer he is proud of the fact that his trails are being used competitively, but his ultimate reward is that the trails have become an important part of a community’s lifestyle. Morton often uses the Thetford trail to run, walk, and ski, and has been pleased to observe how well-used the trail has become not just to racers and athletes, but also to community members such as the Thetford high school teachers, who regularly use the trails to get out for walks on their lunch break. Morton finds it extremely gratifying to know that the trails he has designed, “just get people out in the woods.”

This story first appears in New England Runner and is republished here by permission. Aubrey Smith is the asst. Nordic ski coach at Williams College. Born and raised in Seward, Alaska, she attended Northern Michigan University and was a two-time D2 All American runner and seven-time D1 All American skier. During summers she returns home to Seward to run up and ski down mountains.