The Barkley Marathons (yes, plural) happened recently, which means that there are 35 people out there trying to process failure right now.
They shouldn’t be too hard on themselves, though. This event has been labelled “the race that eats its young” and the “most evil event in sport”.
The Telegraph reports that in the 33 years that the annual marathon has been run, only 15 people, competing amongst some of the world’s top marathon runners, have managed to complete it.
To complete the Barkley Marathons, you need to navigate five 20-mile loops of the course within 60 hours. There are many longer ultra-marathons, some of which take place in 40-degree heat. What makes the Barkley so fiendishly tough is the unforgiving terrain of Frozen Head State Park in Tennessee. Runners who make it to the end will ascend and descend 120,000 feet – the equivalent of climbing up and down Mount Everest twice. Gradients are commonly steeper than 40 degrees.
Oh, and there are no fixed trails to follow. Instead, runners have to make notes from a master map and then navigate their way through often thick undergrowth with nothing more than a compass. To ensure no shortcuts are taken, 13 books (with titles such as “Heart of Darkness,” “A Time to Die”) are hidden along the routes and runners must tear a page from the book corresponding with their bib number. Fail to bring back all 13 pages and you are disqualified.
The first two loops are run clockwise and the next two counterclockwise, although not many people make it that far.
This monstrous course is the brainchild of Gary Cantrell (above), who was inspired to create it by the prison break made by James Earl Ray, the assassin of Martin Luther King, from nearby Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary in Tennessee.
The escape wasn’t successful, but he did manage to go eight miles in 54 hours, so Cantrell figured he could cover 100 miles in the same time.
Thus the Barkley was born, and the race starts when Cantrell lights a cigarette.
He also takes the time to tell everyone that they’re going to fail.
Every time a runner either fails to finish or quits, a bugle plays the Taps, more commonly associated with military funerals.
All of this is recorded in the short doccie, The Barkley Marathons: The Race That Eats Its Young:
If you want to take a look at the full experience, you can follow one of the 15 Barkley finishers, Gary Robbins, as he navigates the trail and actually makes it to the end:
He might have finished, but he doesn’t seem too happy about it.
So even if you win, you lose. That is pretty evil.
This year, only six runners made it as far as the third loop.
Thankfully, this will do nothing to deter the thousands of people from applying to try their luck next year.
[source:telegraph]
