Kristie:
My brother and I set out to do the Saranac Ultra 6er challenge for Memorial Day together, striving to complete the NE8 Ultra challenge. When researching the best route to take, we noticed the FKT site pop up and crunching the numbers to see the pace we'd have to strive for, we went on a mission to go for it. The previous record of 11hr 8 minutes seemed near impossible to beat for female and 9hr 54 min for male, especially because it was my first time hiking this year. After we got through our third mountain scarface (including driving to ampersand) in about 4hrs 15 minutes we pushed harder through the last three and ended back at Berkeley Green in 9hrs 13 minutes. I wanted my brother to get the male FKT so bad, and he pushed me to do something I didn't think i was capable of. It was a perfect day, with so much encouragement from others hiking who questioned why we were running up and down mountains for fun.