It's called the Beaver Creek Vertical Ascent. It was really hard, but fun too, and beautiful.
You run up a 3.5 mile trail gaining 2,100 vertical feet, then take the chairlift down (14 minute ride), then repeat. You do as many laps as you can, and you have to start your last lap before 6 hours expires. (Kraig did 7 laps!)
The first 4 laps went great, I did them in 42, 41, 41 and 41 minutes.
Then I started to crumble. The 5th lap took 46 minutes and the 6th took 52 minutes.
I made it back down to the start with 8 minutes to spare, so I went again for my 7th lap finishing it in 53 minutes. I was reduced to power hiking mostly and I was shattered. It was more mental at this point and I slowly made it up the mountain. I am pretty happy to have completed 7 laps....that's 14,700 feet of climbing and 24.5 miles of uphill running/hiking. This is a similar amount of climbing that I did in a couple bike races in Europe this summer, but running uphill takes a lot more out of you. I was totally exhausted. It felt similar to how I feel at the end of an Ironman. This difference is no pounding. Just 2 days later and I'm already feeling pretty good again.
I made it back down to the start with 8 minutes to spare, so I went again for my 7th lap finishing it in 53 minutes. I was reduced to power hiking mostly and I was shattered. It was more mental at this point and I slowly made it up the mountain. I am pretty happy to have completed 7 laps....that's 14,700 feet of climbing and 24.5 miles of uphill running/hiking. This is a similar amount of climbing that I did in a couple bike races in Europe this summer, but running uphill takes a lot more out of you. I was totally exhausted. It felt similar to how I feel at the end of an Ironman. This difference is no pounding. Just 2 days later and I'm already feeling pretty good again.
I finished 4th overall and won $100.
Here is a link to the results and above is a photo that was in the Vail Daily newspaper.
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