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The Western States 100 mile Endurance Race is a very hard endurance run. It's 100 miles in length on a very arduous trail in the Sierra Mountains of California. The trail starts in Squaw Valley and proceeds to Auburn.
It's a very hilly trail. There's 18000 feet of climbing and 23000 feet of descent - so on average the runners are climbing or descending around 400 feet per mile. In places there are long grades at 1000 feet per mile - or 1 in 5 - 20%. Very hard indeed. Running uphill is almost impossible - walking hurts - even coming down such trails involves pain!
The weather conditions are always challenging, from below freezing in deep snow at the start to blistering hot in the canyons. Some years it reaches 120F on the trail in the afternoon. The trail is very rough and you can seldom take your eyes off the ground. Then there's the altitude, parts of the trail are almost 9,000 feet above sea level. And just to make it even harder, many participants are on the trail for more than 24 hours - so they run for about 8 hours of darkness! The rules require you to cover 100 miles in less than 30 hours. Amazingly, the runners call it "Fun".
Our club Stevens Creek Striders has been doing the aid station at mile 43 for about 25 years. It's near the ghost mining village of "Last Chance". The station has facilities for medical, radio, rest, food, water, drop bags and runner wash. A team of more than 30 volunteers makes this happen. We camped at "Last Chance" on Friday night and were setup and ready for our first runners to arrive about 11am on Saturday morning. After we closed at 5.15pm, we cleared up and drove to Auburn to watch the winners arrive in the stadium about 9pm.
The team was lead by Jean, Bob and Marsha and everything went very smoothly. Dr Bob lead the medical crew. The team worked well together to give all the runners a rest. The club prides itself in providing one of the biggest aid stations in the event - I hope all the runners enjoyed their time at "Last Chance".
Thanks everybody who came for your wonderful company and the friendly atmosphere on the station. It's such a privilege to be part of the club. Lots of familiar faces - and two new members this year. Thank you Padma and Kiran for joining us.
Lightbox click here - 2.97mb download
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