We had an early shuttle from Bourg St Maurice back to the trail at Les Chapiuex, because we had a big day in front of us to get all the way to Courmayeur – 19-20 miles and 5500’ of climb! We grabbed some breakfast on the way to the shuttle from a local cafe, but I found later my chocolate croissant was missing! 😦
I grabbed a quick coffee in Les Chapiuex, as well as a chocolate croissant to replace the missing one, while the others started out. But after I finished, I jogged to catch Kelly and Kelly and we hiked the 1st few miles together.
Some photos on the road and trail up to Refuge des Mottets, where we’d start our 1st big climb.
The climb to Col de la Segne, the border between France and Italy, had amazing mountain views the entire way. On the way down to the valley, I couldn’t find the water source — in hindsight it must have been up the side trail to a Refugio a bit. But I kept on going, which would later come back to hurt me a bit.
Our friend Jase was going to be in Courmayeur to run the GrandTrail Courmayeur 100k that night, and I started seeing these flags on the 2nd big climb… So I texted Jase to see if we were on his race course and we were!
I also caught up with Scott at the top, so we did the rest of the hike together… down a big drop to a Refugio which thankfully had some water – I had been low for far too long! I Ddrank a lot of water here, and then headed down down down. The ladies would end up taking the chairlift and gondola down from here, as it was an extremely steep 2-3 miles without any views.
We had a couple miles to hike through town to get to our bead and breakfast – Maison La Saxe, which was very nice, though not so easy to find! (All those little streets were a maze and google maps was not very helpful.)
After we all cleaned up, we headed into town, quite hungry (hangry?), and we found an amazing pizza place, Ristorante Pizzeria du Tunnel.
And of course, good gelato. Mine was dark chocolate (darkest ever) and coffee:
After that, we met Jase and his son Cade near the race start at 10 pm:
Then we headed back to the bead and breakfast to crash — we were all so tired!
(I’ll try not to go 2 months between TMB posts, or I’ll forget too many details!)
After breakfast at the Refugio, we opted to head in to town to buy some lunch for the day. We ended up w/ salami/sausage and cheese, not just cheese, due to a language barrier, but eventually got some very nice cheese only. That and baguettes and we were good to go. I wanted to hit the rest room before we left, and this is what I found at a public one in town:
After a short flat trek, we came to Notre-Dame-de-La-Gorge:
And then it was a big climb…. And this is where it started to feel pretty crowded! I passed a lot of people, and it was all beautiful.
After the pass on the way down, I ran into this!:
And the did block the trail!:
Scott and I had a couple hours in Les Chapeaux, and we had very little cell coverage with Kelly and Kelly, even if I got on the local wifi. We were supposed to take a taxi in to Bourg St. Maurice, and found there were vans running every so often. But several were booked, and Scott and I didn’t know when the ladies would arrive. We ended up just getting 4 tickets for the last shuttle, which was a lot cheaper (and safer!) than trying to get a taxi. Safer just because we weren’t sure how long taxi drivers were going to be around!
We had a nice hotel in Bourg St. Maurice and a good dinner right there too. We had a big day the next day, so booked an early shuttle back to the TMB the next day.
I should rewind a bit after the prelude, and talk about the logistics of the trip. I would guess upwards of 75-80% of people who hike the TMB use tour guide companies to at least help with accommodations, though a quick check with Grok and it might be less. Either way, self booking can be pretty complicated. There is a site that ties most/all of the Refugios together, but if you want to mix it up and use some hotels and some Refugios, it gets harder. That combined with having a distance range in mind per day, trying to secure lodging when different places open reservations on different days, etc, and it can be quite difficult and time consuming. All that said, KellyE took it on to manage all of that, and KellyB and I are incredibly grateful! From securing lodging, buses, breakfast/dinner/lunches, and luggage transport, KellyE had it all planned and documented for us!
Wednesday, July 9th, we woke up in Chamonix, had breakfast at our hotel “Plan B,” and jumped on an early bus to Les Houches. We were getting a little nervous that maybe we were at the wrong place as our bus was late, but there were other folks there that were obviously going out for long hikes. We later found that the buses in the area are often several minutes late. Our bus eventually arrived, we boarded and had a good 10-15 stops before Les Houches. At each stop, more and more people got on. It was soon quite crowded! But we made it to the bus stop right across from the Arch that is considered the start of the TMB.
And we were off! (After we watched everyone else get photos, and we took a few of our own.)
We had about a mile or two on flat ground before we started climbing! Scott and I got ahead of the ladies, and I quickly saw that navigation was not always going to be obvious. There weren’t always signs at road/trail junctions, or if there were, I thought they could be a little confusing. I was using Far Out and could see where I needed to go, but I was worried KellyB might not have been as familiar navigating with that. So I jogged back down to Kelly and Kelly, got KellyB set up with Far Out and the TMB maps, and started back up. KellyE always had paper maps as well as the book descriptions of what to look for. We really needed all of those sources over the course of the trip!
I reached a water stop and bathroom, and opted to run back a little to the ladies so we could enjoy some of this section together:
There were some huge slugs!
It was near the water stop when I overhead a group of runners talking about pin holes in their bladders, and I asked if they had tried to patch, but the one had just received a replacement from Salomon.. I told them that I had several pin holes right before “a big event,” and the patches didn’t help, so just had to order a new bladder rather than try to get a warranty replacement. One of the ladies asked what the big event was, and I was like “uh, Barkley.” I hadn’t really planned to say the event name, but she asked directly! They were all quite surprised! Normally I don’t really talk about that event much, and this was the only time all week it came up with anyone outside of those I was with.
Eventually I took off from the ladies to run the last bit. This was when there started to be some discrepancies between Scott’s GPX files and the Far Out app. And even the street signs weren’t always that helpful. One example:
The red line is supposed to be the main route, and the purple is an alternate. I ran up to the red, but it was just a paved road, while the purple was a trail along the river. So I opted for the latter which looked much nicer. This would become a theme the rest of the trip… Debating between Scott’s GPX files, the Far Out app, and what was actually there in real life! Scott’s was nice because it actually took us right to our lodging locations when they weren’t on the trail, so I just used a combo.
I got to the Refugio and it wasn’t open yet, but Scott and I sat on the deck for a while. Eventually the owner came and let us in, and I got cleaned up and had enough time to wash and then dry my clothes in the sun. We had a nice dinner and the four of us were in a private room, with a shared bathroom (with a bunch of ladies from Norway)!
I thought I might write a more in-depth race report, but instead I’ll share what I posted to social media immediately following the race, and then supplement it with a bit of info on gear and nutrition, as well as more photos.
What I wrote a day after is raw and emotional and I want to share that feeling here:
I’m having trouble putting into words the emotions I feel having participated in the 2025 Barkley Marathons, to me the pinnacle of the “do hard things” ethos my endurance pursuits have gravitated towards over the years. I have paddled a boat for 38 hours / 340 miles on the Missouri River, run 100 miles at altitude or in near freezing rain — the list could go on.
But the Barkley has been the hardest event out there — with just 20 finishers in 38 years. To toe the line after years of dreaming about it, after years of trying to get in, was somewhat overwhelming. I had imposter syndrome leading up to it, and as I summited the very first hill as the last runner out of the 40 starters, it was hitting hard. I have no idea why I couldn’t climb that 1st hill, but once I summited and started the descent, I started catching others, found the 1st book, and was on to the next climb, where I was able to hang with those I was now around.
I’ll write a much more in depth report on the 2sparrows blog soon, so won’t go into much more detail here. But from the 2nd climb on, I felt better, and after a few hours found myself in a group of five — John, Matt, Kenny, Nathan, and myself, two veterans and three virgins — all with the same goal — get all the books on loop one no matter how much time it took. Thankfully Laz had given permission at the start to be out there beyond the cut off, and we took that to heart. We did quite well other than book 9 — where we spent at least 5 hours, attacking and re-attacking, but all to no avail.
We finally had to abandon it, but we were not defeated, we were determined to continue. Matt did decide to head back to camp at the Fire Tower, while the rest of us continued. I had been thinking in my mind we’d have to send one of us back, just to let everyone know the rest of us were still alive, uninjured, and determined to continue. We had yet to see an elite runner pass us on their loop two, and literally had seen no one else for over 15 hours, so no one in camp knew we were ok or that we were together.
The remaining 4 of us trudged on, down Rat Jaw, up and down a couple more mountains (where we lost John on the last climb who told three of us to go on), and on to camp and the famous yellow gate. 24 hours and 30 minutes on an incomplete loop one. But I never felt defeated — this was clearly the hardest Barkley yet — three time five loop finisher John Kelly was barely able to eek out the only fun run (3 loops) of the event, with less than 10 minutes to spare before the 40 hour cut off. And that included two 15 hour loops! It was incredibly challenging, incredibly humbling, but at the same time incredibly validating – even though I didn’t complete loop 1 in time or with all the books, I belonged.
I estimate we covered 30-35 miles and 14,000-15,000 feet of vertical, 90% off trail. (More than one loop should be, but re-attacking book 9 three different times added a lot of distance and vert!)
So incredibly thankful for my wife and crew Kelly Allenbaugh Butler who had no idea where I was for 20+ hours… And stayed up into the wee hours waiting…
Nutrition
Below are the day and night bags I had made. Not shown in the day bag is that I put 4-500 calories of Tailwind in both of my bottles. These equate to about 2500-3000 calories each and about 4-500 mg of caffeine in the night bag. With the late start time and me thinking a single loop could be well over 13 hours, I ended up carrying a day bag distributed in my pack and belt as then threw in a night bag in the back of the pack – just in case. This saved me, as when we finally reached the fire tower about 18 hours in, I had to calorie count what I had left to ensure I could make it, otherwise I would have had to head back to camp from there.
All the food was good — the only time I had trouble was with how dry the SIS Go Energy Bakes can be. I would of course had some real food on an inter-loopal if I had gotten that far.
Gear
Not shown are a few items like a naked running belt etc. The pack was a Salomon Adv Skin 12 which was borderline too small — if the weather had looked bad I might have had to carry a larger pack. I did need my belt to hold a few things — some nutrition and the course description.
I wore both a wrist compass and had a plate compass for bearings, but I almost never used the plate compass. Mainly because the runners I was with had already written down bearings and were faster checking/taking them in the field. But I would certainly carry both again.
The light set up was great. While the runners I was with all had to change batteries a couple times or pull out a 2nd/spare light, both the flash light and headlight I had never needed battery changes. They both take 18650’s and I had purchased Orbtronics 3600mAh batteries, larger than the 3400mAh Fenix offers. Flashlight is Fenix PD35 v2 which has a max lumens of 1600 (I see they now have a v3 which goes to 1700!), which we used extensively as we approached books or searched the distance for land features such as a spur or draw. None of the other guys had a bright handheld, but all of them said they would definitely carry one in the future! I have used this set up extensively for Rogaining and it really is key to have a bright handheld as you approach controls or to get a lay of the land. The headlight is the Fenix HMR65R-T v2.0 which I kept on the 2nd lowest setting all night — never needed the brighter settings since I had my handheld.
Clothing/shoes
I definitely had trench foot after 24 hours… I had slid into a stream at hour 3 or 4, so my feet were wet early and stayed that way. I had injinji toe socks with an over sock. I would go with a thinner injinji next time. The La Sportiva Cyclan was great, even though it’s advertised as a mid-distance shoe. The traction is really good on the crazy steep terrain we covered.
I also used XOSkin liners and had no chaffing (liberal amounts of Squirrels Nut Butter!!). A Stio Eddie short sleeve was fine — bright so everyone knew who I was. Arm warmers, a buff for a hat. (I had forgotten a real hat, but the buff was fine in this weather. I thought I didn’t have any gloves so my fingers got cold in the deep night up on the ridges in the wind, but found gloves the next day when I emptied the pack. 😦 )
All in all happy with all the gear choices!
Video
I also want to share this great video from the single track podcast which has both Kelly and me in it in a few places — didn’t hurt that we shared a camp site with Ron the filmmaker…
A few miscellaneous photos:
I’m still on cloud 9 a week after having been “out there” — such a long time dream for me that finally came true. It was a great event with a great group of people and I hope I’m allowed to participate again in the future.
That’s not to say it was a bad year, two ultras and an (unsupported) ironman isn’t bad. :-). And I finally, after years of trying, climbed over 365,000′ in a year (walking, hiking, running, virtual running, biking, and virtual biking).
I think that’s the 1st time since 2018 that I’ve run over 1000 miles. Yep, just checked:
(2019 I took off 5 or 6 months to see if the sacrum would heal…)
Anyway, all good. Three big events, but there was a time in August leading up to IronDad I felt like I was training like a professional, hitting several 15 hour weeks.
Well, that was a long long time ago, and I’d wanted to go back and get the full Art Loeb Trail run done since, it just never worked out. There’s been a group that has run it on or near the Winter Solstice for years, including my old AR teammate Charlie. And one of the other OG’s Matt Kirk (fool on the hill) have been talking about some adventures in 2025, so when I could make it on this year’s solstice run, I jumped at the chance. The other runner was Kevin Lane (Lane in the Woods) and Carl Laniak camped with us and drove us to the start, and then went for a hike.
I drove the van and picked up Matt in High Point, and we made our way over to Davidson River Campground in Brevard. It was quite cold and Matt would be in his tent (with Kevin), while Charlie had his conversion van, and Carl slept in his mini van. There was a lot of bantering about DALTAR — a double ALTAR, but in the end, no one was up for it. Brad Keyes started Friday night with thoughts of a double, but ended up doing a single.
We left camp early, and on the drive up and over the pass to get to the start, hit some pretty good snow coming down. The mini van made it, and we were running by 7:30. The other guys were faster so I ended up spending most of the day alone. There was another (large) group of runners, with a full support crew and aid station at the bottom of Pilot, and they were kind enough to offer me food, drink, and water, but I just took them up on the latter which meant I never had to filter water all day!
31 miles, 8000′ of climb, in a little under 10 hours:
I did see Brad as he was nearing the finish, about 1-2 miles in for me (he had run all night with a couple friends):
Lot of snow and rime ice up on Black Balsam:
I don’t know if this will become an annual run — timing so close to the holidays may not always be easy — but I would definitely do it again.
My Dad passed away on September 4, 2023, as I wrote a little bit about in last year’s BFC post. But sometime after that, earlier in 2024 I suppose, I started thinking that I would do an Ironman to honor and commemorate his life. He was an Ironman, with over 20 IM finishes all over the world. In fact, I was able to watch him race in Lake Placid, Western Australia, and in Kona in 2012, where the photo above was taken.
When I was 12 years old I watched Julie Moss crawl across the finish line and told myself someday I’d do an Ironman. And while I did a few triathlons in the mid 90s and even early 2000’s, I soon discovered Adventure Racing, and drifted away from the sport. And eventually found Ultra Running, and never made my way back to triathlons.
But this was my chance to do it one time — in my own way. I first searched around for off road Iron Distance events, and only found one, but the location and timing of that didn’t work out. So I started thinking about doing my own solo / unsupported / non-event Ironman, and I came up with a plan… We’ve spent the last couple Labor Days at Lake Tillery, and I was able to work it out with the support of my brother-in-law and father-in-law to go a day early, to have them support me in the boat.
I was up around 5:30 – 6:00 and we were in the boat heading up river around 6:45 for a 7:00 am start. No one was on the water, and it was beautiful.
I figured I’d be in the water around 80-90 minutes, and that’s exactly what it was. I had hoped for a little current in the river or draft of the boat to speed me up, but no luck!
A change of clothes and some food, and it was off on the bike. I had a roughly 50-52 mile loop to start, so that I could come back to the house and eat and resupply food and water. The 2nd loop got really really hot (93F!) and I finally called Kelly who was driving over for the weekend, and asked her to bring a couple bottles of ice water so I could dump them over me and try to bring my body temp down. After that, I met Kelly a few miles away to ride about 10 miles of gravel — while I had originally thought to do a lot of the “event” on gravel, in the end I opted for a lot more pavement so I wouldn’t be out there 24 hours or more!
(I blame the RD on the slightly short distance — but in reality the addition of the gravel ride as well as some looping back and forth, and I’m guessing I was less than 2 miles off!)
On to the run. I had plotted a course from the house up into Uwharrie where I’d hit the same trail I’ve run the 40 mile race on ten times. This would have been difficult on a few fronts — water was so low that filtering would have been difficult, so I would have needed water support twice, and I was trying not to be a burden on the family. I still set out with that plan in mind, but then a crazy rain, wind, and lightening storm hit about 2 miles in to the run! Normally I wouldn’t be too bothered by that, but the trees bending over the road and the lightening finally forced me to seek shelter. Luckily, there as a “strip mall” style church I was near, though just a single building:
I sat on that bench for maybe 10 minutes before I thought “with this awning, I can probably go back and forth.” And each length, the GPS picked up 0.01 miles! And you better believe I took advantage of that — for about 40 minutes while waiting for the storm to settle down, I went back and forth and covered nearly 2 miles:
Once the storm calmed down, it was getting dark, and River Road was pretty busy with people coming in for the weekend. And visibility was bad with it still raining and foggy. I’d have to go a couple more miles on that road with all the traffic, and then need water support. So I opted to go back to the neighborhood which is relatively small, but I thought I could get a 2-3 mile loop in. That worked just a couple times before I got blocked out of the neighborhood by an aggressive dog! I did another mile back and forth just in the beginning of the neighborhood before I finally pulled out my mace, found a big stick, and started yelling at the dog. With the rain it was foggy and misty and I couldn’t really see it, but the barking backed off and I was eventually able to get by. But now I had 10 more miles to go and was down to running 1/3 mile on 3 different roads, going back to the house every 2.5 miles to get water and/or fuel.
Thank goodness Kelly and Riley came out for the last two hours, or I might not have finished. But I persevered and did finally get it done!
Here’s that 3 way intersection I hit oh so many times!! Oh, and by the way, this is a very hilly area as you can see – 2500′ of climb!
Again I blame the RD here for showing 25.2 miles. But in reality with the amount of turning back and forth, this is another time I’m gong to say the GPS would likely be short. 🙂
I finished up around mid-night. I estimate I spent at least an hour “in transition” (if not 90 minutes!) making my own food and filling my own bottles, etc. And it was never really about time, it was wanting to do something my Dad had done so many times.
Next morning I was able to put on his Kona finishers hoodie:
I’m pretty sure I’m one and done for Iron Distance events, though I do love to swim, and have come to enjoy the gravel bike. Not so much on pavement with traffic, though… And while I was training, YouTube some how figured it out and kept showing me all kinds of documentaries about extreme events like the NorseMan… So you never know!
But for me, doing this event in honor of my Dad’s life was important to me, and I’m glad I was able to get it done.
This race was a struggle for me last year as I was pretty sick and probably shouldn’t have been running. This year, I got off the wait list about 4 weeks out. Oh Snap! I’d not run more than 8 miles since Hellgate back in December! So I quickly got a 20 miler in 4 weeks out, and a 17 miler in 3 weeks out, as my only prep. But the philosophy is “The Event is Life,” and taking that to heart, I should be able to jump into just about any crazy adventure in a very short time period. So it’s not like I hadn’t been training, I just hadn’t done any long runs in 3 months.
My phone died early so I only have two photos from the course that I took!
The race photographer caught these two:
Casey and Riley surprised me at the finish, so I have these as well:
I ran much better this year — as I should have not being sick. 13 hrs 14 minutes compared to 14:22:51 — so over an hour faster. I was also 33rd out of 97 finishers and 120 starters. So not too bad for an old man that feels quite slow these days! I’ll take it!
My only real insights is that I’m a strong climber — this race has 3 major climbs and I did not get passed on one of them, but often passed 5 or more other runners. But most of the time, all of those I passed would fly by me on the downhills. I was once a good downhill runner, but as you get older, you get wiser (or more likely just scared). I do worry about blowing up the quads going too fast downhill too early, but there were also some technical trails here that are sketchy (to me) to take too fast.
Strava data:
Funny last year’s GPS data showed over 14k, which I know is wrong. But I think this course is closer to 12,500 not 11,608!
Nutrition was a base of vFuel and Tailwind, and I supplemented at the aid stations with whatever looked good. At the last aid, I grabbed a 1/4 grilled cheese and started back on course. About 20 steps in I took a bite and immediately turned around to get a couple more — they were so good!
Gear was Hoka Speedgoat 5, injinji toe socks, XO skin base liner with a TenThousand short above, and then the Hellgate Patagonia Capiline from 2021 up top, with a NorthFace vest when the weather got cold. I did wait too long to put on my injinji gloves climbing Mitchell, where the weather was mid 30’s and damp and windy. Should have put them on much sooner and I suffered for that. I didn’t bother changing into dry socks up top — I knew the trails down were going to be swampy and they were.
Shoutout to Brandon and Tanawha Adventures — they always put on great races. Great course, great aid stations, very well organized, etc.
2023 ended up having more races than recent years — I think I did 6 or 7 ultras — Uwharrie (40 miles) (10th time, I’m now retired!) (*), Mount Mitchell Challenge (40 miles), Mount Mitchell Heartbreaker (50 miles, 14k elevation), Grand Canyon adventure run (40 miles), Barkley Fall Classic (~35 miles, 12k of elevation, and Hellgate (66 miles, 13k elevation) .
I didn’t do any of the challenges I mentioned last year like a Everesting or vEveresting (bike) challenge, nor the marathon on the concept ii rower. I really need to make a list of these ideas and knock them out one at a time. Other adventures I need to get serious about are The Quad (4 state AT challenge), SCAR, etc. And I’ve actually never ridden a century on the bike! All things to think about in 2024 and beyond.
(*) I reserve the right to run Uwharrie again if some special reason arises!
Here come the normal graphs I track….
First up, elevation. So I’ve still not hit 365k in a year, and think that’s going to be tough until we live I the mountains some day! But it was still a good year at 308k (Strava graph further down shows 311k?). (I still think 2021 may have some elevation that shouldn’t be in there — Garmin DH mountain bike tracking counting the chairlift rides up, for example??)
Next up is total time… I always put in 550, not really sure why. 500 should be the goal, which I hit this year. :-)
Running – goal was 1000 and surprisingly I hit it!
Barely:
Riding – pretty low:
Strength training, was again a focus, and will remain so. Last year I had created some strength bench marks to shoot towards, and to be honest, I actually lost some strength. The way the year worked out with all the running races made it hard to make big gains in the gym. But I still spent a lot of time there and feel healthier for it!
And a few from Strava. This shows a pretty even split, I’d like to see biking increase a little.
And this shows the numbers here don’t line up exactly with the ones above, but they are pretty close:
Fairly even distribution on climbing, but the summer months when at the coast or Puerto Rico hurt!
This one is funny – it shows top 1% which I thought was impressive. But then I saw someone else post a 1% — yet she had nearly 3 times as many hours tracked as I did! So there are some real outliers in that top 1%
And that’s a wrap. I probably need to change the goals to time based (other than elevation), or just delete some of them and focus on the big two — total time and total elevation. Otherwise I sometimes track to those more than I should.
Plans this year – SMR relay run in April as an ultra (6-man team) and Barkley Fall Classic is it right now as far as races, but there are other things under consideration that may pop up. Just nothing that can be announced yet. :-)
Ah, Hellgate…. I’ve only run it twice now, but it has become as dear to me as Uhwarrie 40 and Barkley Fall Classic. Such a hard course — starts a at midnight and then 66.6 miles and ~13,000′ of elevation change over single track and forrest road (grass, gravel, rock), finishing at Camp Bethel.
I missed it last year — my application didn’t make it past the “race committee” (e.g. Dr. David Horton himself). Either my credentials weren’t up to snuff, or what I’m guessing (hoping!) – my attempt to send an electronic copy in from Greece via email didn’t meet the race’s old school method of snail mailing in an application once it’s posted to the Internet in early to mid October. I was in Greece celebrating my Dad’s 80th when the application was posted, so couldn’t print it and mail it. I tried to edit the RTF file (!!) on my phone, and formatting looked terrible. But I didn’t have much choice.
Anyway, I was able to get in this year and was excited to give it another shot. In 2021, I kind of fell apart after mile 45 or so with a tweaked knee and incredibly sore feet, so much so that I had to limp in much of the last 12-15 miles.
Kelly and I drove up in the van, scouted Aid Station (AS 5) in the daylight so she would know where to go (to sleep after the race start), grabbed some food at a little mountain cafe, and went to registration check-in and the pre race meeting at Camp Bethel. Horton is a hoot and the meetings are a ton of fun with a lot of laughs, yet the important messages are not lost in that fun atmosphere. After the briefing wrapped up around 8:30 or 8:45 pm, we opted to head right to the start rather than wait for the caravan to leave at 10:50. We arrived and a I spent a little time packing my gear, and then tried to rest. Rest never came so around 10:50 I got up, made coffee, and started getting dressed. Checked in with Horton at 11:40 or so, then waited for the 12:01 start.
The race went better this year than 2 years ago. I felt so much stronger and would have expected my times to be even better than they were, but I’m not complaining. The only real issue I had this time is temperature regulation. Starting at midnight, and running in the mountains up and down from elevations of 1500-2000′ difference means you will get some temperature swings, but it felt like it could have been a little more than that. There were points where I felt clammy running downhill if I ran moderate for more than 8-10 minutes. Daylight came, I met Kelly at AS 5 (mile 31 or so), changed clothes, and the clamminess never really came back.
While there are 9 AS’s I only have times for when Kelly met me and wrote them down, but it’s a good comparison of 2021. vs 2022. Note these are the “official” mile markers but everyone knows they are off and the total distance is much closer to 66 than 62… My times are in:out.
AS
Milage
Horton Time
My 2021 time
2022 time
1 – FSR35
3.5
12:45 am
2 – Petities Gap
7.5
1:37 am
3 – Camping Gap
13.1
3:13 am
4 – Floyd’s Field
22.4
5:38 am
5 – Jennings Creek
27.6
7:00 am
7:06 – 7:20
6:59 – 7:09
6 – Little Cove Mountain
34.5
8:33 am
7 – Bearwallow Gap
42.5
10:30 am
x – 11:16
11:04 – 11:05
8 – Bobblets Gap
49.5
12:00
1:00 – 1:04
12:48 – 12:51
9 – Day Creek
56.1
13:36
x – 14:32
14:51 – 14:54
10 – Finish
62.4
14:45
16:49
16:15
While the times improved steadily, the biggest difference here is the time from AS 9 to the finish. This year I was actually able to run down the last 3.5 miles, whereas in 2021 I had to shuffle as any uneven ground really hurt the knee.
That was good for 80th out of 120 finishers (145 starters) and 8th out of 15 (16 starters) in the grandmasters. I certainly don’t stack up in the results like I did 6+ years ago, but I’m going to blame that on running 20 miles per week (instead of 40-50), and carrying more muscle around. I probably train the same, if not more, in total hours, but I bike and lift a lot more than I did back then. Age is of course a factor too, I just don’t think it’s as big a factor as training changes. But maybe I’m kidding myself. :-)
Photos all from Kelly as I never got my phone out… In fact I didn’t even listen to the playlist I made until the last big climb!
A few screen shots from Strava data. For the HR, that was my Whoop (on my wrist) broadcasting to my Coros, not a chest strap. But looking at it, I would think fairly accurate. (In reality I felt like I was red lining a lot, but know that wouldn’t have been possible…)
That last one shows I definitely slowed in the last quarter of the race I little more than I would have liked — about 30 minutes slower than the 1st quarter. I do feel like my 1st mile or two was probably a little fast, but it felt pretty good so I went with it.
2sparrows 