is going on right now. It's the original "last-man standing" event. Once an hour you have to start a new 4 1/6-mile loop. If you miss a start you DNF. If you are the only one to finish a loop within the hour you win. Last year it went an incredible 59 hours before Harvey Lewis finally yielded to Guillaume Calmettes. This year we are 54 hours in and there are FIVE runners left! Guillaume, Courtney Dauwalter, Johan Steene, Gavin Woody, and Greg Salvesen.
https://my4.raceresult.com/110552/?fbclid=IwAR0Mp2Ofo658Fi8PM5WjdlzHe5FwDa9-09LIyfPh41InXfWD_4VFSjmVYyI#0_B3DC1F
Lazarus Lake's hourly updates alone make this worth watching.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/142055916440410/
Oh and the loop is a not-so-easy trail loop, during the day. At night it's a much flatter road loop. So if we have multiple survivors through 60 hours and the end of daylight, it is likely to go to 72.
One day = 100 miles. 300 miles in 72 hours is a pretty damn significant accomplishment, let alone in this format, where your only breaks come in the handful of minutes you have between laps.
For that matter 200 miles would win most 48-hour races, but here we have five well past that – in the same race. Incredible.
Are we there, yet?
Guillaume is out after 54 laps. Four left.
2024 Races:
03/09 - Livingston Oval Ultra 6-Hour, 22.88 miles
05/11 - D3 50K 05/25 - What the Duck 12-Hour
06/17 - 6 Days in the Dome 12-Hour.
I almost have to root for Courtney she is so dang tough.
Istria 110k 4-6-2024
WS100 6-29-2024
UTMB 171k 8-30-2024
MCM 10-27-2024
I lost my rama
Hour 61 and still going. Crazy Amazing!
3/17 - NYC Half
4/28 - Big Sur Marathon DNS
6/29 - Forbidden Forest 30 Hour
8/29 - A Race for the Ages - will be given 47 hours
Always rooting for Courtney. Although she needs no rooting.
5/11/24 Grizzly Peak Marathon, Berkeley, CA
7/20/24 Tahoe Rim Trail 56 miler, NV
9/21/24 Mountain Lakes 100, OR
Anybody that deep into their pain cave after that much running needs all the rooting they can get imho
Lazarus Lake to Big Dog’s Backyard Ultra Run Group
68 hours: dreamtime
the race for me had become an endless repetition,as i made my way around my circuit of duties.hour after hour i went thru the same unchanging tasks.
the core task was the bells and whistles.that was the one that had to happen every hourand had to happen at the same time every hour.
walking across the nearly empty field to tend the fire,it was filled with the ghosts of the throngs that had crowded it at the beginning..a couple of isolated tents were all that remained of the once bustling tent city that had flowed across it a few days ago.
the fire itself had once been surrounded by defeated runners and crews warming themselves by the glowing orange coalsand flickering yellow flames.now only a couple of lonely souls without tents huddled beside the fire in yard chairs.
the fire was almost burned down,so i added a few logs and started across the empty grass towards the sole remaining pocket of life,the timing tent.
on the way i thought about what to write about in the update i would send out after the start.i was determined to come up with something conciseand squeeze out a few minutes to sleepbefore i started out on my rounds again.i had amassed a total of 37 minutes of sleep since getting up on race morningalmost exactly 3 days ago.
a couple of sleepy timers sat in the tenttrying to keep warm .their duties had dwindled along with the field.and there were now only 2 runners left alive.courtney dauwalter and johan steene.
they were the best of the best.tough, talented, and extremely competitive.we were resigned to an indefinite stayas they whittled each other away.we all looked forward to the sunrise,now only 5 hours distant.
the remaining competitors were ensconced in a pair of big tents about 20 feet from the empty starting corral.wrapped in tarps to keep out the freezing wind,they appeared deserted.
i watched the clock accrete its numbers,and at 3 minutes till blew the whistle three times.
there was not a sign of life from the tents,as i thought back to 3 days earlier...
when three whistles had drawn a throng of runners to crowd the corral.at two minutes till i sounded the whistle again.
up until a few hours earlier,courtney had come out to stand alone in the corral at two whistles.it was a blatant display of indifference,as the rest of the dwindling field had come to the corral later and later,scraping for every second of rest they could get out of their too brief interloopal periods.there is a little bit of poker in the backyard race,and runners took every opportunity to show strength.
courtney had finally succumbed to the need for that extra minute of rest.
one whistle sounded.still i stood alone in a nearly empty fieldin front of an empty corral.the darkened tents betrayed no signs of what was (or was not) going on inside.
it was impossible not to wonder what i would do if no runners answered the bell...
and there was no winner!
at 30 seconds the two gladiators emerged from their tentsand walked to the starting linestanding silently awaiting the bell.
as i counted down the last 10 seconds i saw courtney turn to johan,and say something.they exchanged a few words blown away in the wind,and then they embraced....
and i knew instantly what had just happened.
only one runner remained in big's backyard.
i watched johan's slender figure disappear into the darkness,as courtney walked over to her husband (boyfriend?)and they stood a long time in a sad embrace;then she walked over to mea deep sorrow washed over me as we hugged.what could i say to this magnificent warrior?she had fought a good fight.she had run 279 miles in less than 3 daysand broken every man in the field,save one.she had absorbed unbelievable punishment without flinchingendured intolerable pain without a whimper.she had run to the very brink of victory.but walked away with nothing.
truly. what could anyone say?
she went into her tent,and the backyard seemed totally empty.
it was a long wait for johan to complete his victory.he would later tell me it was the hardest lap of the race."once i knew i had won, i could feel all the pain."
the joy of victory was overshadowed by the loss of his last rival and companion.
it is always this way when the backyard ends.you have suffered so much together.shared the pain and the effortgone through so muchfor so long.in the end losing them is like losing a piece of yourself.
after it was all overi went to the little house to start my update.
the update i had been putting together in my mind was,of course,gone.
how to express the flood of emotionshow to explain the loss of purposei could not.
i thought about the wasps we had seen around camp all weekend.while they were everywhere,no one got stung.
this time of year the wasp nests are dead.and the wasps who had tended them all summer no longer had a purpose.they flew, or walked, about aimlessly.they were still alive.but they no longer had any purpose.
i felt like one of those wasps.
i looked at my laptop,sitting there and waiting for me to put words in it.and no words would come.
so i gathered a few of my possessions that i would need in the morningand walked up the hill to the big house to get some much needed sleep.
maybe tomorrow i would be able to explain big's backyard ultra.
Johan Steene:"If there had been a predestined finish line at Big’s Backyard my money would have been on Courtney to win, she would beat me at any such race and distance. But at the Backyard you draw your own lines. As long we are at least two remaining there is a feeling of purpose, that this painful game has a meaning. That illusion disappears in a blink when only one remains. The actual winning needs to be the sole focus if that is what you’re after. That focus was feeding me and let me put all other things aside. At the moment when Courtney congratulated me and remained in the coral as I jogged away alone into the Tennessee night I didn’t feel joy. I felt empty and without purpose. You can not carry the illusion by yourself. It takes at least two to play. Thanks Courtney Dauwalter for taking us this far. We are good at playing this game."
Very insightful article, at least I think so, on the race.
https://deadspin.com/ultrarunner-courtney-dauwalter-takes-on-the-worlds-most-1830136537?fbclid=IwAR3p2SJg0BTUnlCII76dVgLkxfTPTZlHbq2Jj4phk4RMR_lLZ4xUF8Nt62A
Very insightful article, at least I think so, on the race. https://deadspin.com/ultrarunner-courtney-dauwalter-takes-on-the-worlds-most-1830136537?fbclid=IwAR3p2SJg0BTUnlCII76dVgLkxfTPTZlHbq2Jj4phk4RMR_lLZ4xUF8Nt62A
Thanks for sharing. That was a good read.
That was a good article. Laz, I think we all understand the difference between a finisher's medal and a win.
Just put my name in for next year. In case I don't make the 24-hour team (24-hour Worlds conflicts).