Wanderous-Adventure Hacking

It’s 5am and under the glow of flood lights and hum of generators the runners wait on the starting line. For some it will be the last time they stand still for 35 hours, for others it’s the first step towards great pain and discovering their true limits.

Humans are not adapted to traveling long distances. It’s why we ride horses, invent cars and live in small communities. Yet, despite nature’s insistence, a few hundred people gather in Lake Tahoe every year to run 100 miles – four marathons back-to-back, no stopping.

I’m quite happy to be on the sidelines for this event, photographing it for my friend Mark Dowds. He and his childhood lad (they’re Irish) Adrian Eagleson are running it together. Both turning 40 this year, they decided to undertake one crazy challenge per year to fend off boredom and entropy – Year 1 is the Tahoe Rim Trail 100 ultra marathon.

Neither had run more than 50 miles previously and were in unknown territory. As we drive the twenty minutes to the start, everyone sits quietly in the darkness, lost in thought, calming their nerves. I wonder how these guys are going to pull it off.

I do some running, not much. My platypus feet cap my range at roughly 20km but I have friends that run marathons and that’s a huge accomplishment in my eyes. So running four of them back-to-back is beyond my comprehension. How do you pace yourself? How do you prepare psychologically? Well, it turns out you don’t. When it’s your first time you just get out there and wing it.

Sprint runners (distances of roughly 5000m) can sustain 8 minute miles. A 10 minute mile is the average speed for a marathon runner. Mark and Adrian’s goal is 100 miles in 30 hours, about 18 minute per mile. The winner of the Tahoe Rim Trail 100 will average a blistering 10.6 minutes/mile sustained for 17 hours 40 minutes. That’s endurance.

About an hour after the race begins the sun rolls over the Sierra mountains, revealing one of the most beautiful and varied landscapes I’ve seen. You can walk through desert scrub brush, up a pine forest trail and look down at a cobalt blue lake with snow capped mountains in back. For someone who spent his childhood in the flat, unchanging Canadian Shield and skiing down a hill made from a pile of garbage, this is shocking.

The course follows the Tahoe Rim Trail which runs up and down the hills surrounding Lake Tahoe. It’s only accessible by car at two locations: the start (also the halfway point and finish) and Diamond Peak, a ski chalet at the foot of a 2 mile, 2000ft climb that’s openly cursed by everyone who climbs it – simultaneously the “glimpse of heaven and taste of hell” the organizers vaunt from the website.

Tunnel Creek is the hub of the course with racers passing through it eight times but it’s only accessible via a 3 mile, 1700ft hike which I find myself climbing often. Moving deliberately upwards it can be covered in just over an hour but, being the Toronto flatlander that I am, it takes me closer to two as I stop and involuntarily do my best Double Rainbow Guy impressions.

At the top of Tunnel Creek stands the aid station, a micro community of tents and volunteers providing water, food, medical attention and motivation. This is where I will join Mark and Adrian to run the 13 miles to Diamond Peak as their pace/safety runner. These stations are scattered throughout the course and staffed with doctors (usually ultra marathoners themselves) who weigh runners and check blood pressure. If a runner drops too much from their starting weight they’re given a chance to rehydrate and continue or get pulled out, no questions asked. The type of people who undertake challenges like this are often so headstrong and motivated that they ignore the body’s warning signs and need a 3rd party to step in before they get into serious trouble. One runner proudly recounted a story of pushing to the point where he collapse and couldn’t move. They had to carry him out on a horse and he spent the next two days in hospital on a dialysis machine.

That afternoon Mark and Adrian are moving at a very good pace. When they come through the halfway point at Spooner Lake it’s only 11 hours after they started – well ahead of their 30 hour schedule. The cheering supporters raise runners spirits but only temporarily. Before long, the crushing reality that the toughest part is still ahead hits.

That’s why pace runners are allowed at the halfway point onwards. Pace runners’ duties, in addition to refilling water, fetching food and cleaning feet, is to motivate. A big part of that is getting the runner back on trail quickly at aid stations. Even five minutes of sitting can set in inertia making it impossible to get back up. Words between runners and crew are often terse, bordering on abusive; but in the runner’s fragile state of mind, only orders keep them moving. It’s no time to be nice – it’s bootcamp.

The guys are all smiles at Spooner Lake but not all is well. Mark has rolled both his ankles and is worried about the lingering pain and possible ligament damage; Adrian’s mountaineering experience has kept him straight and upright but bad blistering on his toes and soles is slowing him down. After new socks, clean feet and a quick bite they’re off again with Albert, the first pace runner who will carry them over the halfway hump. Several hours later it’d be my turn, then Webb would take over at dawn for the 20 mile home stretch.

The trail to Diamond Peak is a narrow swath cutting up and over a ridge to the ski chalet over a half marathon in distance away. It’s apparently scenic but the sliver of moon that night isn’t bright enough to reveal it. At 1am, we leave the food and safety of the aid station at Tunnel Creek and run into the dark. It’s a strange feeling to run in darkness – you retreat into the cocoon of your headlamp and lose all sense of direction and time; just your thoughts and your feet plodding on remain. Fatigue exacerbates the darkness and eventually my mind begins to play tricks on me. I begin experiencing visual and sound hallucinations: hearing voices, seeing lights in the distance and the shadows cast by my hands look like people running beside me – the chalet seems like it’s around every corner.

I earn the title of Worst Safety Runner as I fall asleep running several times that night. I thought only sharks could sleep while moving but now I know better. It’s much like dozing off while driving and equally dangerous. I hope Mark and Adrian don’t hear the slipping and stumbling behind them but they do and later anoint me ‘Mr. Sleepy.’ For four hours we traverse the ridge yet we hardly talk. At one point we come across another runner stumbling down the trail. He’s barely lucid and if it wasn’t so ridiculous we’d say he was drunk. He mumbles about wanting to sleep and asks how much further. We take a moment, sit next to him, feed him some caffeine and energy gels and get him moving. I’d later see him crossing the finish line in a sprint just behind Mark and Adrian.

When we make it to the chalet the sun is coming up and brings with it new energy – I start to feel better. Adrian catches a short nap while Mark has his feet bandaged up. Then Webb, as fresh as is possible from a night of sleeping on the floor, rallies the boys and they’re off on the 20 mile homestretch.

In their battered state, this final leg takes seven hours to cover. But when they do, the reward is beer, a blood pressure check and a bigass belt buckle to prove it all happened.

I ran a half marathon that night, the farthest I’ve ever run, yet I feel like I’ve accomplished little in comparison to what Mark, Adrian and the others did that weekend. I wouldn’t have believed it was possible for humans to run 100 miles without stopping but as I watch people of all sizes, shapes and ages cross that finish line, I am in awe. Sore, beaten, and blistered they were, but also beaming with pride and a newfound confidence. Congratulations to all who finished and all who tried, and especially to the Irish duo who can now clip on those gaudy belt buckles, swagger into a bar and over beers start planning crazy adventure #2. I hope to join you on it.

To see more photos from the race click here.