Neill showed me this article about the “Ultimate Marathon” today.
For most long-distance runners, a marathon is the crown jewel – the pinnacle of human endurance. But Correspondent Lesley Stahl reports on runners who are tackling five marathons in a row.
They’re called ultra-marathoners, and in their world, the toughest race of all is the Badwater Ultramarathon through a scorching desert and halfway up a mountain, all without stopping.
Wait a second before I quote anything else. 5 MARATHONS IN A ROW. They mean consecutively. 1 Marathon=26.2 miles. 5 marathons=131 miles. Are these people nuts? I can see the satisfaction of completing a marathon, or even the Ironman. But running 131 miles in a row. That’s just stupid.
It’ll be a 135-mile course that winds through Death Valley , a stretch of the Mojave Desert that is considered the hottest place on the planet. Temperatures can reach over 130 degrees.
The asphalt gets so hot here – up to 200 degrees - that runners stick to the white line to keep their shoes from melting.
What?? What kind of torture is that? Who wants to run on 200 degree asphalt? FUN.
The race goes on for 30 non-stop hours. The Badwater race starts below sea level and goes up 8,400 feet to the finish line halfway up Mount Whitney, the tallest peak in the lower 48.
Wait a second. It’s not only 135 miles long and goes on for 30 straight hours, but you are going UPHILL the entire time?? Yup–I think I’ll send in my registration now.
At the 20-mile mark, Karnazes stopped at a 7-Eleven and he wasn’t the least bit out of breath. “I usually can go maybe 10 hours without feeling too much,” says Karnazes. “And then, after that, it goes downhill.”
At this stop, Karnazes only bought coffee. But on runs where he can burn up to 30,000 calories, he’s been known to down an entire cheesecake. And get this: He’s even ordered in.
“I run with a credit card and a cell phone, so when there is not a 7-Eleven around, like some of the country roads out there, I can get him to deliver a pizza to me. And I kind of give them a coordinate, a corner,” says Karnazes. “It happens quite often, actually.”
20 miles without being out of breath? I run from my computer to the bathroom and I’m out of breath. And what kind of pizza joint is going to deliver a pizza to someone who is running. They always ask for an address. You can’t just say, “well, I’m running right now, so depending on your delivery time, I might be in a different place.” What happens if you run outside of their delivery area? Do you slow down in order to get the pizza?
Well, you can read the rest of the article for yourself. If you want to run it with me, just post it below and we can send in our registrations together.
I’m not referencing the death of the Back to the Future series, because that will always live as a classic movie series. I’m talking about John DeLorean, who developed the cool “winged” sportscar that Michael J. Fox drove around in time. 
Take a read of the article–you might actually learn something.
