It's Hellgate Time – Ni puha, ni pera
December 7, 2007 by Bryon Powell · 10 Comments
I’ve been told to go to hell on many occasions and at 12:01 tomorrow morning I will. You see since RD extraordinaire, David Horton, spawned his Hellgate “100k” half a decade ago, he has started it at 12:01 a.m. on the second Saturday of December. The course is hilly and long and I refer you to Aaron Schwartzbard’s informative and entertaining Hellgate course description for the blow-by-blow details. (This is, by far, the best course description I’ve ever read.) Also check out this cool multimedia article from today’s Roanoke Times, the source of both images below.
Hellgate 100k course map- image from Roanoke Times
Don’t ever let Dr. Horton’s pleasant, outgoing demeanor fool you, he is sadistic as they come. Why else would he send 100+ runners down nasty, rocky in the dark and cold of December? When I say “cold” I don’t just mean cold by Virginia standards, I mean eye freezing cold. What I mean by dark is a bit more obvious – sunrise is around 7:20 a.m. these days. That said, as of a few days ago, it looked like Hellgate was finally going to be graced with great conditions – with forecast lows only in the mid-30s and highs in the mid-50s.
Then about a week ago, Horton suggested that this year the course is a bit “leafy” on top of the usual fun. The very late leaf season and the lack of heavy rains since the leaves fell are mostly responsible for this phenomenon. From my runs in the Shenandoahs the past two weekends, I can confirm that the trails are wickedly leafy – much more so than isnormal this time of year. For long sections of trail, I was running through a foot or more of leaves unable to see the multitude of rocks hidden below. Basically, I’ll be shuffling through leaf piles for many hours tomorrow….
… that’s when I’m not running on ice. On Wednesday, Virginia received its first snowfall from an overproducing Alberta Clipper. According to Dr. Schadenfreude Horton, about 3 inches of snow fell in the mountains that we’ll run over. This snow will have thawed and frozen before the race meaning there will be plenty of ice. Of course, there will be ice on the course from the freezing rain that’s falling in the mountains right now! It looks like I’ll finally get to try out my Kahtoola Microspikes.
Hellgate 100k elevation profile with aid stations- image from Roanoke Times
For a 100 +/- runner race, the men’s field is quite solid with:
- Keith Knipling – He could cap off a crazy good year with a win here – this is his kind of course.
- Aaron Schwartzbard – A speedster who will be running his fifth Hellgate.
- Serge Arbonna – Serge won Hellgate in 2005 and finished 3d last year.
- Sean Meissner – stud from Oregon, but can he handle the beastly east coast trails?
- Mike Schuster – I’ve never seen this guy run slow.
- Don Padfield – A tough Virginia mountain runner.
- Derrick Carr and Scotty Mills – Two ultra experienced ultrarunners the rest of us could learn a thing or five from.
- Greg Loomis – Due to nail one before 2007 is out.
- Steve Baker – A fast, young runner who could bust a good one at anytime.
- Jeff Turk – All I’ve got is that he’s from Connecticut and finished 4, 6, 7, and 10 in the four runnings of Hellgate.
The top of the women’s field include many of the women you’d expect to see at a difficult Virginia ultra, including:
- Annette Bednosky
- Bethany Patterson
- Michelle Harmon
- Sophie Speidel
- Kerry Owens
Ni puha, ni pera!
Related articles:
- 2007 Hellgate Race Report [Quick Version] While I’ll have more to say later, I did, in fact, drop out of Saturday’s Hellgate 100k. By 10 miles in I was feeling very weak and despite pounding Clifshot...
- How to Fill a Race Schedule in Two Months As of August 31, my running schedule for the remainder of the year was completely empty with the exception of pacing duties at the Grand Teton and Wasatch 100s the...
- This Week In Running (December 2008) Welcome back to the final 2008 edition of This Week In Running. With the holiday season upon us, and with TWIR set to take its winter break, today we take...
Bryon Powell is the Editor-in-Chief of iRunFar.com, which he founded five years ago. Also the author of Relentless Forward Progress: A Guide to Running Ultramarathons and a contributing editor at Trail Runner magazine, he's quickly approaching 10 years as an ultrarunner and 20 years as a trail runner. These days he calls Park City, Utah and its trails home.
All posts by Bryon Powell
Ni puha, ni pera, indeed!!! Dude, where did you learn that? :)
Next year it’ll finally be December 13th (my kids’ birthday in on 9th, so I could never attend) – so watch for my frozen ass. But for now – get ‘r done!
I learned that during Russian class in college. I need to set up the k chortu for the race report, ya know. ;-) You have one guess for who chert is in the story. A hint: it’s not Woland.
I’ll be on the look out for you next year.
Oo, oh, ouch…
Shouldn’t you be working or something like that?
Doh – stupid rocks! I hope I don’t keep you waiting too long at the finish. ;-)
Oh, I’m working. Today has been ridiculous. It’s a day than can’t end soon enough… but will last well into tomorrow!
Yeah, that’s the kind of work I thought you were doing.
Best of luck at Hellgate! I’m looking forward to hear how the spikes work out. I tried mine in the snow thinking it’d be icier than it was, but all they did was ball up snow in the spikes. At least they’re easy to get on and off.
Hope you didn’t get injured. Didn’t see your name on the Hellgate finisher’s list.
Nope, no injury – just mentally weak and perhaps a bit over raced of late.
Was very sad not to see your name – will we hear details?
Yes, Olga, you will here details – just as soon as my work life isn’t crazy. I was in the office for 9 hours on Sunday and will be here until 9 or 10 tonight. Thanks for checking in!