The fastest runner usually wins the race. But for ultramarathoners, it’s more important to stay warm, hydrated and “keep your head on straight.”
That’s what Chris Heiden said last week before he and about a dozen friends ran up to 100 miles on Bainbridge Island trails. Five of them planned to take three trips around the 33.3-mile course. The others were going to “only” do a lap or two.
Heiden hoped to finish in about 24 hours. He said depending on the course it can take 17 to 30 hours to complete a 100-mile ultramarathon. “I hope to finish before the sun comes up Sunday,” he said, adding a head lamp guides him through the darkness of night.
At times running that far can be intense, but surprisingly Heiden said it’s a “pretty low-key community. It’s less intense of a sport than you might think,” he said.
He explained that races often have tents every 10 miles or so with food and a fire going. “The key is to spend as little time as possible there, and don’t sit down,” he said.
Heiden said many of the races include a lot of climbing, so many runners actually hike that part of the race. “It would be foolish to run every big climb,” he said, “unless you are absolutely elite and born for this type of thing.”
He said there is a lot of strategy involved. “It’s a war of attrition,” he said. “Everybody starts to fade at some point. The winners are the ones who slow down the least.”
Heiden, 34, said he didn’t start running until about 10 years ago when he ran his first marathon and, “Things kind of escalated from there.” He ran his second marathon, and said, “It wasn’t that hard,” so he tried an Ironman. “I struggled to get to the finish line.” He did his second Ironman, and again thought, “It wasn’t that bad.”
So he tried a 50-kilometer run on trails, and found that more to his liking because he finally was able to avoid injuries, which had plagued him earlier. “It’s a less-repetitive grind than road racing,” he said.
Heiden ran his first ultramarathon about seven years ago in Hell, Mich., where they end the race going through a swamp then are greeted by the mayor dressed as the devil. He said he received a DNF (did not finish) in his first four long races, but finished his last two.
The toughest course he’s competed in is on Orcas Island. It’s four times around the island, but each lap they go up Mount Constitution three times. It takes place in February, so it can be raining in the lowlands and snowing on the mountain. “It’s completely brutal. Mentally it’s really, really hard,” he said.
Heiden had a plan to keep that from happening in the “Bainbridge Ultra Running Team,” or BURT, 100. He planned to give the five runners their prize, a belt buckle, at the beginning, and then they would have to give it back if they DNF.
BURT includes about 25 runners. They started running at Grand Forest about three years ago, and the group grew from there. They ran a 50 miler a while back, and it was “so positive,” Heiden said. “People were just itching to do something” after being locked up due to COVID-19.
They had planned to do an ultramarathon on Bainbridge Island but COVID accelerated that. They set it for last weekend because, “That’s when our collective families could tolerate it,” he said, adding they want to express gratitude for all the people who manage the trails on BI. The event started and finished at Battle Point Park and included 4,000 feet of vertical climbing. “In the COVID era it’s a great way to get outside and escape the four walls of the home office,” he said.
Heiden, who is married and has two kids, works from home for Zillow. He also likes to build things with wood, but “This one takes up almost all my free time,” he said of his hobby of ultramarathon running. He runs between 45 and 55 miles a week.
You might think he goes through quite a few pairs of shoes at that rate. “I have four of the same pair of shoes sitting on my porch right now because they get wet in the winter,” he said, adding he gets about 400 miles per pair of shoes, or until “the tread wears off.”
Organizer injured
Mark Goodro, who helped Heiden organize the run, has been an ultramarathoner for five years, but this was his first 100 miler. He finished, but he had to walk the final 35 miles because of a knee injury. Since he was one of the organizers, he said that motivated him to finish, even if he had to walk for 12 hours. His wife and others joined him for part of the walk.
He said he wasn’t as prepared as he would have liked because of the injury. “I did not put in as many miles as I normally would for something like this,” he said, adding even though he could barely lift his leg Monday he still hopes to compete in another 100 miler in June at Port Gamble.
Goodro said the BURT 100 went so well they’d like to make it a little bigger. He’d like the group to become more involved in the community and do things like have trail work parties.
Goodro said they received many positive comments about the event, even from very experienced ultra runners. “We were proud to come up with such a challenging course,” he said, adding some of their earlier course ideas were harder.
What he liked about it was the variety. They would run on road for a few miles, then easy trails, then harder trails.
“I don’t like to do the same thing for a long time,” he said. “I like being engaged with the trail. I don’t like monotony. I like to focus on what I’m doing. It takes all my attention. I don’t like to think about work or politics. I like to be in the moment.”
Chris DeNucci agreed, telling Heiden it was a hard course “with so much variety and challenging footwork that you can never get into a rhythm.”
Heiden said hard is not a bad thing. “Most of us would be better off with a little more physical suffering in our lives.”
The route
The 33.3-mile course links Battle Point Park, Grand Forest West, Grand Forest East, Woodward Trails, Sportsman Club, Lost Valley, Kojima, Gazzam Lake, Oddfellows/Tani Creek Trails, Port Blakely, Trails near Toe Jam Hill, Fort Ward, back to Gazzam, back to Grand Forest West and back to Battle Point. (Repeat three times.).
Results
Ricardo Hoffman won the 100 miler is 23 hours, 52 minutes. “That really puts into perspective how sneaky hard the course is,” Heiden said. “Everyone involved was planning on breaking 24 hours, and Ricardo ran away from the pack early.” Greg Nance finished in 25:26, Greg Snyders in 26:27 and Goodro in 30:30.
In the 54K, Chris DeNucci won in 4:54, followed by Trenton Gibbons in 5:51, Ben Kerby 7:15, Matt Reiswig 7:20 and Rasham Nassar 7:45.
