2017fktoty

The AT has a long history of very strong efforts with the men including David Horton ’91, Pete Palmer ’99, Andrew Thompson ’05, Scott Jurek ’15, and Karl Meltzer ’16, all supported. Joe McConaughy bettered them all while going Self-Supported, being 10 hours faster than “Speedgoat” from the previous year.

François D’Haene smashed the previous supported JMT FKT by over 12 hours, running the route northbound, and was the first person to complete the route under 3 days. His approach was unusual in that by choosing to run in mid-October he gave up daylight in exchange for cooler temperatures and easier access to hiking permits for the area. He also had pacers the entire way, probably a first.

Ashley Nordell has the fastest time Overall (Women & Men) on the Ozark Highlands Trail. The previous best was also by a woman, Jenny Foster, 2d 14h 25m (2009). Iker Karrera bested Andrew Hamilton’s time from June on the Nolan’s 14 by 6h, 2m, including significant time spent being lost.

The California Coastal Trail combines wilderness, beach, and urban running/hiking for 1,200 miles along the coast of CA. An OKT (Only Known Time), Larson’s self-supported trip was an adventure in every sense, and was documented by satellite tracking and an evocative, complete report.

Bryan Williams took the Collegiate West option of the Colorado Trail, which is a little longer (83 vs. 78 miles), with more vertical gain and a generally higher altitude, than the Collegiate East route taken by other FKT trips. Nevertheless, he beat Scott Jamie’s 2013 time by over 7 hours.