As race week approached, I evaluated my year-long goal of running TRT in less than 24 hours, flip-flopping on whether or not it should be my goal. I had earned a silver buckle the year before for finishing the course in under 30 hours and now, I wanted that sub-24 gold.

Carnage. That is the only word to describe the effects of the heatwave which enveloped the east coast. Dreams were destroyed. Months of training, unless they included sauna work, were essentially for naught. Hell, organizers cancelled the New York City Triathlon due to extreme heat advisories that same weekend.

The format at Forbidden Forest is not the usual 100-mile race with a 30-hour cutoff. It’s a no-one-DNFs 30-hour run with the win going to whomever runs the farthest, and special buckles for everyone that manages 45 laps of the 2.23 mile loop, or 100.35 miles. Consequently, the race was a mix of runners with widely varying goals and dreams.

Several of the fifty 24-Hour runners hoped to put up a performance worthy of garnering a spot on a National 24-Hour team. Competition for a spot on the US Men’s 24-Hour team was intense, as a handful of runners vied for the honor of representing their country in Albi, France this coming October.

After picking up our fabulous medals at the raucous finish line, we were treated to a great spread of beer, pizza, rice, beans, pork and assorted goodies. The course was difficult but accessible and the volunteers were plentiful and enthusiastic, which adds up to one hell of a great event.

The views from nearly every trail in the Lake Tahoe region are nothing short of breathtaking. This marked the inaugural year of the Big Chief 50K where for the first time, runners would be able to link a number of trails on one single 50k loop while experiencing every type of terrain with unparalleled views of Lake Tahoe along the way.

We had a very snowy, wet winter in St. Louis. Couple that with epic amounts of snow up north, and you end up with the perfect storm. So, for the first time in six years (and the first time since I’ve been RD), we had to invoke the beloved “Quadruple Bypass” route.

Manitou’s Revenge is run through some sections of the Catskills designated as wilderness areas. By the time runners reach their drop bags, they’ve already run a 50k. What follows is an unholy mess – the Devil’s Path – featuring steep and technical climbs and descents over four of its peaks, some of them more than a bit sketchy.

“Sorry for the long wait, but I can now offer you an entry spot into our race.” These magical words confirmed I had secured a “competitive entrant” slot, just eight weeks prior to the 25th edition of the Umstead 100.

I ran the first edition of Rock The Ridge (RTR) in 2013, and the race has grown into the largest annual fundraiser for the Mohonk Preserve, a private, non-profit land trust that maintains over 7,000 acres of open space in the Shawangunk Mountains in New York.

The scene in the finish area of the Ice Age Trail 50 is a living expression of what most of us love about the ultrarunning community. Runners and spectators alike welcome the finishers – and those who didn’t make it – as they would a friend or family member. If you’re wearing a bib, someone is looking after you.

The advent of spring is the Promise Land 50K. This year it was even more so with all of the rain. The streams were full and the leaves in the lower elevations were an eye-popping green.

I registered for the Bryce Canyon 100 as a training run. My only concrete plan was to run hard. But at the start of the second loop I instantly felt sick on the first climb. I had two equally discouraging choices: quit or hike 40 miles.

Only in its third year, race directors Valerie Abradi and Mindy Slovinsky have put together an ultra event with an old-school feeling and lots of down home charm that will simultaneously delight and challenge you. Riverlands is a great up-and-coming destination race. Put it on your calendar before the word gets out.

For years, the consensus had been that Mike Morton’s 100-mile record, set in 2012, was invincible. But this year, Brett Sanborn beat it by 12 minutes in an astounding 13:20:18. Given that it was a very hot weekend with minimal cloud cover, Brett’s performance was all the more remarkable.

The second annual Hellbender 100-Miler turned out to be a huge learning experience for me. Two weeks prior to race day I made a comment on Facebook about how the attention of a race should not always be on the front runners, but on those at the back of the pack. This race would hit home for me what my comment really meant.

The Teanaway Country 100 stands toe-to-toe with those 100-milers that are notoriously hard. I think that in time, it will be viewed as a low altitude Hardrock. The most obvious factor and where the comparisons to Hardrock begin, is the elevation profile.

Destination races are fun. But, they also are expensive and stressful. That’s one of the beauties of the Hawkeye 50K. Located within scenic Lake Macbride State Park near Solon, Iowa, it’s less than an hour from my front door.

After being runner-up in 2016 and winning in 2017, it felt great to be back on the magical start-line of the Canyons 100K in Foresthill, CA. It was going to be a different ballgame this year, however.

I believe the Badwater experience is about being together in settings that involve intense running experiences, and then having the time and space to recover, relax, and rejoice together.

It was a perfect day for a Run through History with 68 runners signed up for the annual Hellcat 50k endurance run at the North Florida Military Museum in Green Cove Springs, Florida.

Orcas Island wasn’t meant to be this year, but I got to have an amazing running adventure with my friend in Washington and run some hard and beautiful miles, just in time to taper for LOViT 100.

The long stage is the most feared stage of the race. This year, for the 34th anniversary, it was sandy and hot. Not really a day at the beach. 

This is my seventh Marathon des Sables, and it took me three days to write this story. Three days of heat, sand, wind and miles of stony plateau. Three days of acclimatization, digestion really, of what the desert had in store.

The Wells Mills 50K is in an area that includes about 650,000 acres and is nearly as large as Yosemite. However, it’s right smack dab in the middle of the most densely populated state in the Union: New Jersey.

HURT hasn’t had course conditions like this since 2011, when rain poured on race weekend. Back then, the finish rate was only 29%. It’s gotten as high as 60%, so we were wondering if people might stop thinking of the HURT 100 as a tough race.

The Wild Duluth 100K and 50K races were created in 2009 to show off a new segment of the Superior Hiking Trail that spans the entire length of the City of Duluth, Minnesota, staying predominantly on the ridge overlooking the mighty Lake Superior. The trail is spectacular, and the views are plentiful as the trail crosses rocky overlooks, waterfalls and creeks, under stately white pines.

It’s difficult to top a magical Pacific Northwest island when it comes to trail running. Race weekend is a special experience, from riding the ferry, experiencing the slow pace and artsy vibe of island life, cruising along some of the greenest forest trails you’ll ever see and soaking in panoramic summit views from Seattle to Canada and the Cascade Mountains to Puget Sound.

Held at Camp Millstone 4H Camp in Richmond County, the race consists of three 10.4-mile loops on the North Carolina Game Lands. Like all Fat Ass events, there are no t-shirts, no awards and no whining.

At 66 years old, could I still go the distance? Was 2019 going to continue my bad luck from 2018? Could I still notch a 100-mile finish as a spanking-new granddad and add Florida to my long list of states where I’d run a 100-mile race?