At 2am on August 16th I set out from the Capitol carpark with 30 hours of food, a water filter, helmet, headlamp, windbreaker, gloves, and an emergenvy bivy bag. My original plan was to do the ridge to Capitol from the Cap-Daly Saddle but Mountain rescue was there with helicopters flying around looking for someone. I figured a headlamp moving along the ridge was the last thing they'd want to be worrying out so I opted for the standard route instead. I had all my landmarks mapped out and was ahead of schedule at Snowmass, pretty much on schdedule at the Bells and a bit behind at Pyramid but still before my 7pm turn around time to do the sketchy banana descent. If I wasn't at the summit by then I was going to do East Marroon as I knew it was VERY loose in there. After wading through eyeball deep Aspen's and Willows going up Easy Marron felt like carpet. The majority of the day until there had been boulder hopping or scree sliding sketchyness. It was my first time running through the night which was really challenging, there were frogs everywhere and I didn't know if I was hallucinating. By the time I got to Conundrum it was freezing. Rocks were all icy and and I was really regretting not bringing a puffy. I got to the top of Castle just before sunrise and jogged down to the boulder field. Unfortunatley after dodging rocks for 26 hours I wasn't able to dodge one more and got toally smashed in the shin. I thought my leg was broken for a while but I was able to weight bear and walked slowly down with my poles as crutches to Ashcroft. Big thanks to Austin for the drop off, Ryan for the pick up, and my cheer crew of Jinne, Marieta, Marina, Austin, Rich and Ryan for sending my inreach messages along the way. You all truely made a difference. Thanks to Simi - I borrowed your GPX file :).
I'm really hoping this can have a Bannister effect. I can't wait to see so many other strong women knock this time down. I already know I can go a few hours faster so there's definately someone can go way way faster.