Last year, for the fifth year in a row, there were no finishers at the Barkley Marathons. Vermont’s Sue Johnston and British runner Jasmin Paris own the best women’s finishes, with three laps in 20, respectively. We tracked down stories from seven runners, from virgins to veterans.Īlthough Utah’s Jared Campbell has finished it three times (2012, 2014, 2016), the only other runner with more than one finish is Colorado’s Brett Maune (2011, 2012). RELATED: The Barkley Marathons got weird this year. 1999 Hardrock winner Blake Wood tried Barkley eight times between 19, but only finished once, in 2001. Frozen Ed Furtaw, author of Tales from Out There, a historical account of Barkley, has attempted the race more than a dozen times.
More than half of the contestants each year are previous Barkley veterans. Since the race’s inception in 1986, only 15 of the roughly 1,000 runners who have tried Barkley have completed it. (Photo: Preston Keres/The Washington Post via Getty Images) Competitors rip pages from books titled, “The Reasons I Won’t Be Coming Back,” “When Bad Things Happen to Good People,” and “Bright Days, Stupid Nights” to prove they had made it through difficult areas of the Barkley Marathon, on Ma. “We’ve made it easier to try to assure a finisher,” Cantrell said before this year’s event, though it’s likely that he wasn’t being straightforward or remotely honest about that assessment. RELATED: Barkley RD Sparks Debate on Inclusion Previous winner John Kelly (2017) has returned to Frozen Head, alongside Jazmine Paris (the first woman to complete the three-loop “Fun Run”), Karel Sabbe, Harvey Lewis Jared Campbell, and rookie Damian Hall. Requirements and times to submit an entry application are a closely guarded secret with no details advertised publicly. It’s a brutally hard event that only a select few runners get the chance to enter every year. Runners battle the steep hills, bramble, and brush, not to mention wet, slippery, and often cold conditions as they try to complete successive loops. What is the Barkley Marathons? In theory, it’s a race that consists of five 20- to 25-mile loops with about 12,000 feet of climbing. When race organizer Gary “Lazarus Lake” Cantrell lit his cigarette at 9:54 A.M., about 40 runners began the quirkiest race in the world of trail running at Tennessee’s Frozen Head State Park. It’s time to refresh your Twitter feed, because the Barkley Marathons got underway on Tuesday morning. Heading out the door? Read this article on the new Outside+ app available now on iOS devices for members!
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