Jeff Colt (Zealand '11, Lonesome '12, Madison '14, Greenleaf '15 and '16, Tucks Caretaker
I started at 5am at Carter.
I took a sweet digger 2 miles down the trail and cut open my hand, leg, and bruised some ribs.
I once again got lost on the damn nordic trails in Great Gulf and turned around thinking I was lost, only to be reassured when I saw a trail sign (.6 miles of back and forth).
My phone was jostling around and buttons were being pushed, so it went into disabled mode from Mizpah to Galehead.
A friend, Peter Howe accompanied me from Greenleaf to Lonesome.
I carried all of my own food but I DRANK A GLASS OF TANG, because I love Tang.
Madison- 1:58
Lakes- 3:24
Mizpah- 4:18
Zealand- 5:55
Galehead- 7:52
Greenleaf- 10:05
Lonesome- 10:57:47
Reflections on the idea of an "Unsupported Hut Traverse":
I had a lot of time to think about the Hut Traverse yesterday. Yesterday was my third attempt and second finish. I have followed the FKT pro-board since 2011 and have never before seen anyone classify their run at the Hut Traverse as "unsupported". There has never been an "unsupported" FKT and a "supported" FKT for the traverse.
If you ran a race and you didn't take any food from any of the aid stations, you only filled up water, would you be taking any aid? Certainly.
The Hut Traverse is meant to be a route that connects 8 points in the mountains where hikers can find services. We run this route differently say than another 50 mile backcountry route because of this. The huts offer services to everyone: clean potable water, restrooms, shelter, and if you want food, coffee, or lemonade. Water is the primary service the huts offer. I hope we don't reach a point when folks are doing the Hut Traverse and filtering their own water. But I do advocate for having a single FKT for the Hut Traverse if you take water from the huts.
I purposefully drank Tang to make a point here folks.
Comments
Hi Jeff, congrats on an impressive run!
I just wanted to throw my two cents in there and say that I completely agree with your sentiments on an unsupported traverse. The very spirit of the run centers around a "semi-supported" nature, that is; finding periodic refuge in the mountains within these fabulous huts. It certainly feels like receiving support when you fill your bottles at a kitchen faucet and catch your breath in the cool shade of the huts. The reason I brought all of my food from the start was because it seemed easier to have a set caloric strategy ahead of time rather than leave it to chance with the hut goodies. It was only after my run, when I was making the formal submission to the website, that I even noticed there was a difference between "self-supported" and "unsupported" and after reading around the website it seemed like my run could go either way, so I selected both and left it to the discretion of the FKT peeps.
All this rambling to basically say that I am fully in favor of my run moving to the "self-supported" category. It just makes more sense.
Again, great run Jeff, hopefully I'll get to take another crack at it next year!
Cheers,
Liam
Done! Thanks for helping clarify this, guys.
Liam,
Thanks for not taking my comment offensively. I meant no ill-will or suggestion that what you did wasn't remarkable. The Hut Traverse is always talked about amongst hut croo each summer at the huts, but your effort earlier this year created an entire new buzz about what is possible. George's time has stood for many years and the record needed some fresh energy!
I have no doubt that you can best my time with another go next summer and I hope that you do! I'm still impressed by your splits, I was kicking my own ass out there trying to stay ahead from Zealand to Galehead, you must have been cruising. Best wishes at your upcoming races and look forward to toeing the line together some time in the near future.
Jeff