This was my first Backyard Ultra experience. It took place in Lindsay, about a 4 hour drive from home, in a conservation area outside of town on the shores of a lake. This was one of the areas hit hard by the ice storm last month, and the race was up in the air as recently as the Thursday before. They decided to go ahead with a modified course.
The modified course incorporated some dirt roads. The closed course was all trail. It was impassable because of all the downed trees. The new course was about 60% back road and 40% trail. There was a significant thunderstorm the night before and a lot of rain, so the course was wet, with a lot of puddles on the road sections. The old course measured a standard backyard loop of 4.16 miles. This one was half that distance, which meant running 2 laps for one "loop".
There were 3 events run simultaneously: 6 hour and 12 hour continuous events, with a goal of running as many laps as possible in the given timeframe, and my 24 hour event run with the Backyard format: you had one hour to complete each yard (two loops in this case), after which you waited until the next hour to begin again. There were 47 total runners, with 15 in my event.
We started at 9am on Saturday morning. It was comfortable at about 10C/50F, but with very high humidity. I kept a slow and relatively even pace, running an 11:30/mile pace throughout most of the day. That gave me 13-14 minutes between laps to rest, refuel, etc. I had a tent set up with a chair inside, as well as all my supplies.
In the early afternoon, a severe thunderstorm hit. They pulled everyone off the course, or at least tried to. They basically had to wait until a runner finished their lap before they could pull them. I was pulled as I finished the first half of a loop, which was basically just after the rain and lightening started. I hunkered down in my tent for almost a half hour while the rain and lightening and wind roared through. It was pretty intense. After that, they decided to reset the clock so that we were running a half hour behind, meaning my race would go until 9:30 Sunday morning.
It had been pretty warm up until then, or at least felt that way. It hit 18C/64F with very high humidity just before the thunderstorm, but now things started to change. The temperature began to fall, and the rain was pretty much continuous from late afternoon on. The course was a real mess, or at least most of it was. The trail sections were decent enough, except for the grassy parts that turned to mud. The road sections were a maze of puddles that you had to either dodge or run through. In some cases, you had no choice but to run through, because they completely covered the road.
At 3:30 the 6 Hour runners were finished. Around that time, I took to putting on a rain jacket at the end of each lap, as I was getting a chill. I would run with it for about 10 minutes, until I was walking up a big hill, and then tie it around my waist until the end of the yard. At that point, when I stopped running, I would get a chill again.
The course was relatively flat, but had 6 hills/loop that I walked. A few runners ran even those hills, but most of us walked them. It never felt crowded, even at the start of each yard, as we pretty much figured out where we should be in the pack before we hit the first single track trail. After that first section of trail, our pack thinned out and everyone basically ran their own pace.
After 11 hours, it started to get dark in the forested section of trail, so I put on my headlamp. It worked well for the balance of my event. A few hours before their event ended, most of the 12 hour runners had dropped out; there were only 3 or 4 left running until 9:30pm. By then, it was cold and windy, and the rain was relentless. I had been keeping my rain jacket on now for several hours, mostly to try to keep warm. At the start of lap 12, we were down to just 7 runners in my event. I was really surprised by that, as there were some really strong runners that had dropped out by then.
My pace was really beginning to slow now, and I was slipping all the time. I never fell, fortunately, but I did come close a few times. My brain was really playing games with me, and I made it to the end of the lap with just 2 minutes to spare. Setting out on the 13th lap, there were now just 5 of us. I struggled to finish, but decided to run two more yards in order to reach 60 miles/100km. As it turned out, I could only make it through the first half of that 15th yard. That gave me just over 60 miles; just under 100 km. But I was done. I was shivering uncontrollably and just had to get dry and warm. I wasn't prepared for the cold and wet that would continue all night. So, a little bit after Midnight, I was out.
I didn't have much in my tent to help me warm up, as I didn't plan on dropping out. I dried off and put on the clothes I had for driving home, and found an old blacket in the back of my car that I pulled over my head as I tried to sleep in my chair until daybreak. I listened to the announcements at the start and end of each yard. 2 other runners dropped out on the 16th yard, so only 2 runners remained: one the shirtless guy. He ran the entire event with no shirt. Crazy. Everyone said so! And a woman who was in the tent next to mine. There were 2 women sharing that tent. I figured one of them would finish, as she looked really strong. She didn't. Her friend, who looked like an average middle of the pack runner like me, ended up being there until the end.
After Midnight, every time she finished, she said she was done. But her friend talked her into one more lap. At 4:30am, I heard her tell the organizers that she was dropping out. They congratulated her on running further than any other woman in the event's history. Hearing that, she decided to keep running! I started packing up after the 2 runners started their 22nd lap at 6:30am. The shirtless guy had just put on a shirt. Amazing. It was SO cold, and the night was nasty. Fortunately, the rain stopped in time for me to pack up.
I would have liked to have stayed until 9:30 to watch the end, but I still had a long drive home, and I really needed to get into a warm car, and I didn't want to get wet again. So, I left. I presume those 2 finished, but I have not seen any results yet to indicate that. The drive home was uneventful; I stopped a few times to walk around.
EDIT: Got the results. The woman dropped out after her 22nd lap. The only one to finish the 24 laps was the shirtless guy. And even he had to put a shirt on in the end. So, just one runner of 15 made it. Says a lot about the weather that weekend.
No real physical problems. A few blisters on my feet, and the normal soreness you would expect after a 60 mile event, but no injuries or anything else that will need to heal. I'll take this week off and then start to run again. I think I may still run the Sudbury Backyard in October, but I'm also thinking that it may be my last long Ultra event. I enjoy running, but I am finding I do not really think it fun anymore to run longer distances in extreme weather. I think I'm getting too old to handle that.
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