With COVID-19 cancelling most races, there are a lot of virtual races / challenges popping up. I opted to do the Great Virtual Run Across Tennessee (1000+km from May 1 to Aug 31), mostly to just keep me getting out the door. But when I saw the Limitless Vertical Challenge, I knew right away I wanted to give 29,029’ (in a week) a shot. I also opted to do it all outdoors, which would be more even more difficult. (Of course I’m not taking anything away from those that did their challenges on a treadmill! That’s certainly no easy feat either!)

Memorial Day came and I got some good hills in both near the 7D home as well as in Linville Gorge with Kelly and Reece. The next few days I stayed a little closer to home and focused on hill repeats. Once I thought 29,029 was in the bag, I opted to go longer — 20 mile days on the AT — so I could go back to parts of the AT I’d not seen in a while.

Here’s the daily elevation gains per Strava.

I ended up with 31,280’ covered in a little under 30 hours, but over 97 miles! Of course, a lot of that was power hiking due to the grade, but there was a fair bit of running too. To go from 20 mpw to 97 was a bit of a stretch, and I definitely felt a bit worn out for a few days.

Below is a gallery of photos from the week…