Two nights ago I fancied watching a documentary and stumbled upon this:

It’s about a really decent, and incredibly capable, Canadian ultrarunner, Gary Robbins, taking on the lunatic challenge of the Barkley Marathons.

Have always been intrigued by endurance events but this one is bonkers. With an off-the-wall co-founder, it’s origins based on Martin Luther King’s assassin’s 1977 prison escape, 100-130 miles and 55000ft of treacherous terrain to be completed in 60hrs and ‘rules’ that kind of change year to year, it pushes the best beyond their limits. Only 15 individuals have completed the full race!

So what races and events are you in awe of?

Red Bull Romaniacs

Erzberg? Rodeo

The Barkley Marathons movie is far better than Gary’s one up there tbh, I’ve watched BM 4 or 5 times, couldn’t really take to GR tbh, dunno why.

The marathon de sable is nuts, but the most impressive stuff for me are the extensions that have been achieved to the likes of the Ramsay round, Paddy Buckley and Bob Graham rounds, some incredible performances, Read feet in the clouds or the mountains are calling for some pretty incredible efforts.

Tbh, I’m most impressed by the female glories, Angela Mudge, Jasmin Paris, Fiona Oakes and Nicky Spinks are all absolute heroes in my world.

The marathon de sable is nuts,

To Joe Public it’s obviously a crazy thing but…

Mates of mine who are decent but not outstanding runners (mainly triathletes really) did the MdS a few years ago and described it as ‘not that hard really’. They said that the big challenge was not the actual running but dealing with nutrition/hydration/chafing. They reckoned that if you’d done all the research on that and trialed all your kit the running itself was pretty straightforward with super generous cut-offs. They thought the big reputation it has was a mixture of marketing hype and people signing up for it as a bucket list thing and not preparing properly.

I would put the solo offshore sailing events like the Vendee Globe in the extreme category. The boats now are doing insane speeds. Skippers surviving on 15 min cat nap sleeps for 70+ days 21k miles and to win now you have to be constantly changing sails & boat trim while analysing weather systems to plot the best course.
Not much chance of calling time out and withdrawing or rescue if caught in a Southern ocean storm either.

Would agree with Spin on the MdS I know well and have trained with 6 people who completed the MdS. Vary from good club runner to mid field marathoner. One almost got caught by the Camel due mostly to blisters.

Not insane like some of the other things being mentioned but if you want a doable, homegrown event that is nevertheless nuttier than a squirrel turd then look no further than the Three Peaks CX.

Yea, the 3 Peaks CX is like wacky racers!

Nah, try a proper race. Title of vid is wrong, it’s 1960 not 1950.

Heard similar about the MdS from mates who’ve done it. A great experience that they cherish, but not what they’d call hard.

I’ve done the timing on a few events that are hard for the sake of being hard, such as The Tunnel Ultra (200 miles running back and forth in Combe Down Tunnel) and The Hill Ultra (160 miles up and down the same hill in the middle of winter) for Cockbain Events. Those attract a certain kind of lunatic.

Not events (as I don’t think many other people would be mad enough to try them), but I’m in awe of a few of the trips that Nicolas Crane has done.

The two that stick out as being really beyond comprehension in their length and/or time scale are ‘Journey to the Centre of the Earth’ and ‘Clear Waters Rising’. The last especially was a 10,000 km walk across the mountains of Europe!

3100 miles running around the same block in New York. There is a doc on Netflix

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-Transcendence_3100_Mile_Race

My sister completed MdS. She’s an accomplished long distance plodder, but tenacity and planning rather than absolute fitness got her through.

I was about to link to the above transcendental race.

Also LEJOG. Non stop. Record was broken by Michael Broadwith. Lots Ride it of course but 43h 25min.

What I love about the Barkley is the way Lazarus Lake always lets someone who has absolutely no chance of finishing in.

I found that 3100 film a bit hard to watch, It came over a bit cultish.

Cycling buddy of mine broke the record for National Three Peaks Challenge Cycle Solo (Male, without drafting) three years ago. Basically ran up Snowdon, Skafell and Ben Nevis with just the small matter of linking them all up with a bike ride of 430miles. Managed it in 37hr 33min. He did a good write up of the challenge:
https://medium.com/@rmalpass/national-3-peaks-challenge-cycling-record-874211c1e200

A bloke at my work is into all the >100 mile running ultras. Like me he has three young kids, at least one of them autistic.

IMO it’s his wife who is the real trooper. She’s looking after the very difficult kids at home while he indulges himself in yet another peaceful 10hr training run.

IMO it’s his wife who is the real trooper. She’s looking after the very difficult kids at home while he indulges himself in yet another peaceful 10hr training run.

Yeah, I remember looking at marathon training “back in the day” and the thought of leaving my wife along with two small kids while I headed off for a couple of hours didn’t seem feasible. Now they’re a lot older I can disappear off all morning without a problem, and when I get back the lazy gits are probably still in bed 🙂

Anyway I’d love to do the MdS, doesn’t look too tough – just too expensive. I was in the Tor des Geants draw this year but didn’t get a place, probably a good thing given how 2020 is turning out 😀 The Spine race looks like a proper tough one, due to the weather conditions.

Any road race. by that I mean Isle of Man TT, Macau etc. Not push bikes

One slip in the wrong place and death. the starter marshal tapping the rider on the back. possibly the last person to interact with them. sobering

I’m not even sure I like watching it, I prefer circuit racing but I can’t understand road racers so I’m in awe. And its totally at odds with modern day safety.

The last of the gladiators

My sister is a bit of a long distance runner. She did MdS years ago. Then the Icelandic one (race of Ice and Fire?). She was the second fastest woman in the Atacama desert version.

She now wants to do one on every continent. I know she has the Gobi one lined up. The Antarctic version looks a little intimidating though – both in terms of the physical and financial.

I’d love to do one of the Super long road races across a continent. More of a lifestyle choice than a race though. There was a brief moment when I thought I might be able to, somewhere between quitting one job and starting the next. Now am only riding locally so Africa will have to wait.

The Antarctic version looks a little intimidating though – both in terms of the physical and financial.

The second bit of that is the one that’s stopping me from a lot of races 🙂

The spine race certainly appears ‘bonkers’ to most people. – I’m not sure there are many events in the UK which are harder mentally and / or physically.

No one’s mentioned unsupported winter ultra racing – ITI, Yukon Ultra, Rovaniemi, Lake Baikal etc. Run/bike or ski for 16-20 hours a day, bivvy out at silly temperatures and repeat. Not just the physical but the mental too – day after day the toll on your mind and body is pretty strong, then you have to encounter problems with gear, weather, navigation.

There are some nuts out there, a lad i go cycling with completed a Deca-ironman last summer and won, 10 ironmans back to back… some great stories of hallucinating from a third of a way in..

I also served with a guy called Chris Moon, he was working for Halo the mine clearance charity, when he lost an arm and leg and other injuries (his first words when he came round were “i’m never going to win an ar*e kicking competition now”) he went on to run MdS, and would love showing the effects of sand on his stump afterwards usually when you were trying to eat or drink…

The stages at mds are moderately sanitised to appeal to the target market of middle aged IT consultants and not particularly extreme, but the details of what happens at the end of the race sound absolutely brutal.

You get on a bus back to the start.

There are 52 runners on the bus and at this point none of the runners have showered or changed clothes for over a week. Many will have experienced runners trots at some point during the event. The temperature is over 40 degrees and the bus journey is more than eight hours.

For me the highland 550 is pretty mad and extreme – I know quite a bit of the terrain from walking and cycling and to do it in the times the top folk do it it is truely mad!

I’ve read Chris Moon book. A good chapter on the MdS.

My sister in law is training for the Pan Celtic Race which is 1600 miles cycling in 10 days – you can take longer but will miss the end of race party! In some ways she’s glad it’s postponed till 2021 to give her another year of training. I was telling her I can remember when a 40 miles was a big day out, now it’s just her after work pootle with regular 100+ mile weekends.

“more people have been up Everest than past Dawson City”
The Yukon 1000 canoe race

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A friend of mine took part in the Barkley Marathons a few years back.

He’s a proper good runner, regular top 5 finisher in Scottish hill races, has won a few and held the Cairngorms 4000ers record for a bit. He’s also pretty hardy with a solo, unsupported, unrecced winter Bob Graham.

Didn’t even finish the fun run of 3 laps. 🙂

“more people have been up Everest than past Dawson City”
The Yukon 1000 canoe race

Only 3 more people have finished the Barkley Marathons than have been to the moon.

Only 3 more people have finished the Barkley Marathons than have been to the moon.

Sorry but that’s incorrect.
15 people have finnished Barkley
I’m pretty sure you’ve taken the figure for people who walked on the moon which is 12. There are an additional 10 people that went to the moon but just sat in their lunar modules. So 7 more people have been to the moon than have finnished Barkley.

Edit: Depending on how you define “been to the moon” and which sources you believe you may be able to include a few more. (Should orbiting the planet count as having been to the moon if you didn’t land?)

And if we’re talking batshit balls to the wall lunacy John Kelly’s attempt at the Grand Round. Paddy Buckley, Bob Graham and Charlie Ramsay rounds Back to back cycling between them. He only got as far as riding a few miles out of Keswick after the second round but what he achieved was phenomenal and even starting out on that was far beyond what anyone else had thought possible.

Sorry but that’s incorrect.

Don’t be such a pedant, I’m sure you knew fine well that what I meant was stood on the moon. You wouldn’t say you’d been to New York if you’d just flown over it.

Edit: I forgive you on the basis of your rapid edit. 🙂