I traveled from Oregon to run the HST from east to west, including the Mt. Whitney summit. It was approximately 71 miles with 14,900’ of elevation gain.
My ambitious goal was 18 hours; this will be a reality for a woman hopefully soon! It was a bit fast for a completely unsupported effort given some of the snags I hit and considering I was very much not trained and did not taper. I’m happy to join the good company on this route!
I learned of this fkt route two weeks ago and realized that I still had time to do it this year if I could get a permit and if weather would hold. To my delight, both were realized. The weather window held the entire lead-up and there was zero precip forecast for 8 days. I considered doing the yo-yo, especially to avoid the heinous logistics, but ultimately my partner drove down with me and made it doable.
In preparation I read every report, looked at Strava data especially splits. I made notes of things people found difficult or important, like the vert in the final 20 miles (there is at least 2k, I promise; and it is so sneaky on the gpx).
I planned to go unsupported. I brought rain pants for Whitney summit but ended up sticking with shorts and being cold for a brief time; I was glad to have a down puffy, and wool shirt and tank top. Also had a light wind jacket. For emergency/safety I also brought a bivy sack, whistle, rain poncho (all courtesy of Destination Trail races), and an inreach mini. Brought a fleece and didn’t use it, nor the puffy gloves I brought. I did not filter water. Never do. Probably don’t make that choice but I drank out of about 50 sources.
I planned to start at 3:19am like the previous couple of men did. This is where shit went sideways. at 1:30am I checked my phone for the time. 2:45 was the alarm. Around 2:15 I had checked my phone again and the screen was black. Wouldn’t do anything- not turn on, not charge, it hadn’t been dead but it wouldn’t do anything, even a desperate factory reset. I began to panic- having only done Whitney and not the rest of the trail, I wasn’t confident with navigation (* most trail signs do not state HST, so it’s important to know the route, have an explicit map, or phone navigation). I use Gaia and always carry an external batter and one or two phone cords (redundancy saves lives right? We’ve all been burned by a cheap phone cord). I also connect the phone to my mini to communicate. On this long of an unsupported route without exit points, communication is important to me. On a mini it’s obnoxious and time consuming. As I’m digesting this, also realizing the cost of replacing a phone and my lack of photo backup of the past couple months.
It was a super bizarre situation and with less than an hour til go time, my partner drew himself a map of how to get to crescent meadows and gave me his phone so I could have Gaia and take the photos required for an fkt report. This would mean we wouldn’t be able to communicate, which made us both uncomfortable- he absolutely had to be at the end when I got there, and I wouldn’t be able to let him know I was running late. We didn’t have service at the portal either and I had to get moving. It was a game time call. I felt it wasn’t preferable but with my mini and emergency gear it was safe enough. I called my dad on Whitney to let him know as he and my partner are the emergency contacts.
Ok- headed up the trail around 3:30am or so, and actually didn’t mind the long climb in the dark. It was very cold but sunrise near the summit was beautiful and the wind was very mellow. On the descend to Guitar, I fell on the only ice I’d see all day- on northwest aspect slab rock- banana peeled, yard sale, and broke my hand (not the first time, can’t do a shaka, lot of bruising and swelling). Some bloody cuts and trail rash on my butt, I wasn’t hurt enough to stop which is good because my ride was on his way to the west side. FKT Queen Ashly Winchester advised me the night before that “if things go sideways you’ve proven you know how to deal with it” and by golly, every other fkt this year has been far too smooth.
The nearly 8,000’ descent to the bottom of the kern was excessive. My sunscreen tube I found was empty and the lower elevations were HOT yesterday. The trail was far more rocky, overgrown, and had a lot more trees down than I think I expected. Definitely not the JMT. I saw the only person all day on the entire HST halfway, at mile 36 the lowest point- a solo female backpacker :)
The climb up toward the Kaweahs was brutal and this is where my perspective and a backpacker’s perspective would vary greatly. I did not love miles 19-48, and most of this is because I was trying to move fast, go through a lot of tough terrain all at once, and I wasn’t relaxing and stopping when I was tired. I had to keep moving, hydrating, eating, no matter how hot or difficult or uncomfortable it was. There is a lot of “runnable” uphill- gently uphill sloping, which is not my forte, especially far into a run.
Those miles were hard. It got better running downhill toward Arroyo, and then much better on the approach to the Gap. 4pm- on had that late evening feel with an earlier sunset. The gap was so gorgeous. This summer I did a 19-day high route with a bunch of climbing peaks that included the western divide, and it was awesome seeing this spot from a different perspective. The sun was setting as I hit the absolute highlight. Precipice lake was stunning in its chilly starkness, and Hamilton and the lakes near it were gorgeous. At Hamilton I took out my headlamp and put some punk music on to scare away the cougars that were probably not there. The last 13 miles were completely dark. I went through the trail cave and after that couldn’t see down into any of the valley I was traversing above, which was a bummer. My headlamp batteries (both sets) were all but dead and the last 6 miles were finished carefully, slowly, with very faint light. See recommendations.
The last 13 miles (18 really) were power hiking as you can tell by my splits. With more light, some of it was runnable. That elevation gain in the last 20 is really sneaky, but a closer look at the map shows just how often the route goes up 100 or 200 feet and it adds up quickly.
I arrived at the trailhead after 19 hours and 47 minutes. My headlamp was so dim I got into the parking lot before I realized I was off the paved trail and out of the woods and then I stopped my watch. My partner, having no phone or watch and no luck hearing the time on the radio and his vehicle’s clock incorrect, had no idea what time it was and had been worried with the darkness. I’m glad I wasn’t out later. I ate my leftover ribs from the Mt. Whitney restaurant, had a glass of champagne and some bread pudding from Schat’s, and passed out in the camper van.
Splits: (I forgot to record some)
Outpost 1:05
Junction jmt trail crest 3:01
Whitney Summit 3:52
Trail crest 4:31
Crabtree meadows 5:45
Wallace Creek Jcn 6:43
Upper kern jcn 7:23
Lower kern 9:38
Arroyo 12:59
Hamilton Lake 15:12
End Crescent Meadow parking 19:47
Recommendations:
Don’t burn out on Whitney
Maybe plan to summit before sunrise- there’s enough light in the hour before, and then there’s more light for later.
Definitely try to do the route with more daylight hours, and preferably not a hot day.
BUY the expensive headlamp batteries! None of that target brand junk.
Before shoving stuff into your pack make sure its not empty, like sunscreen.
Good luck to the next person to take on this route! I am still intrigued by the yo-yo but would wait for longer daylight hours. Don’t hesitate to reach out to me for more info or help in planning if it would be useful.