Tom Ferrell posted:
The fastest previous confirmed time that I can find listed is from Dan Howitt in December 2011. His time was 1:38 up and 2:55 total time. I emailed briefly with him after he ran it, hoping for a race to be set-up on the trail. He indicated he started and stopped at the first bridge you cross on the trail, approximately 0.65 mi from the parking lot [Dan later said he started "closer to the trailhead than he states"]. So my time included an extra 1.3 miles that his did not. He also mentioned that he had done it faster than his timed run (given that his timed run included a fair amount of snow), as I'm sure many people have. I'm posting this as a starting point, as I've been beaten in races by plenty of strong trail runners who I think could best this time. I will be entirely impressed when someone breaks 2 hours round trip, and I think that's possible, though not for me. I could see maybe shaving up to a couple minutes, but yesterday was my personal PR on the trail in 7 years of running it. Overcast with a chill in the air the entire way was just about perfect for running.
www.bendbulletin.com/csp/mediapool/sites/BendBulletin/News/story.csp?cid=1344213&sid=497&fid=151
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtRAgySj_wc
Dan Howitt emailed:
My run-climb was done in mid-December in winter conditions. Over the final 3/4 of the trail to the summit there was snow -- up to 5 feet of snow over the top 1/4 of the trail. Foot traction was very difficult over the final 1/2 of the trail to the summit.
I hired and paid Rare Earth Adventures to time me from the start to the summit. Kapper Richmond was my start-timer. Ashley Briley was my summit-timer. Ashley took some summit photos - below are some, along with a photo of the mountain from the other side of the river.
Some facts: I did the first and only timed (referee-timed) speed run-climb of Mt. Defiance in history; my speed run-climb is the first and only one in history with summit photos; I did the first known speed run-climb in winter (it was 10 days before the official start of winter, but the conditions were 100% winter conditions).
About the use of GPS: Some others who did speed run-climbs in summer conditions have reported breaking my record and cite their GPS data. Max King sent me his GPS tracking after I read in an article that he did a run-ascent in about 1h:10m. His GPS tracking was broken into 3 segments (3 different start-times and finish-times) rather than being 1 continuous event. Some of the others have problematic GPS tracking as well. Aside from this, GPS is not objective, as is increasingly well known. Also, each person lacks start photos and summit photos.