THE ADVENTURE GENE

The problem with editing a magazine as opposed to a more instantaneous media is the built-in lag time (known in the trade as “long-lead deadlines”) between when the material is produced and corralled and when it actually reaches its readers. Many steps intrude: editing, proofing, film prep, proofing of bluelines (a “quick print” version of the magazine pages the printer puts together to catch last-minute glitches), printing, binding, gluing/stapling, labeling, and, finally, shipping. One of the results of the lengthy process is that I’m writing this editorial on July 21 for the November/December issue, which you’re not reading until mid-October at the earliest. By that time the snows will have moved into many of the northern states and Canada, the fall marathon season will be in full swing, the daylight hours will be abbreviated, and the prospect of running in 120-degree temperatures will be limited to those who run in health club saunas.

This week’s e-mail is filled with a flurry of reports from the Death Valley-to-Mt. Whitney course in the far southeastern California county of Inyo. Most of the reports are relayed by Ben and Denise Jones, who live in Lone Pine along the course, and who have for years been the anchors of the course for ultra-adventure runners. At high noon on July 4, 1992, a group of hoary Death Valley veterans held a ceremony at Badwater in which we appointed Ben the mayor of Badwater and all the land he could survey from that point; the fair Denise became First Lady.

Over the years, Ben and Denise have hosted literally hundreds of adventure runners who travel to Inyo County to train or race on the Death Valley-to-Mt. Whitney course. They’ve been a major factor in coordinating the Inyo end of the annual Hi-Tec Badwater 135 race that since 1988 has run from Badwater to Whitney Portal, the “end of the road” at 8,500 feet up the side of Mt. Whitney, the tallest peak in the contiguous United States.

The full course is roughly 150 miles long and runs from Badwater on the floor of Death Valley, the lowest point in the Western Hemisphere and the hottest spot on Earth, over two mountain passes in the 5,000-feet range, and up the side of Whitney to its peak at 14,494 feet.

The window to run the course is July and August, and although the Hi-Tec race is traditionally held in mid-July, anyone can mount an independent attempt on the course during that window when the valley temperatures are at their most noteworthy.

The diversity and flexibility of the course points up the elasticity of the term “adventure run.” The Hi-Tec Badwater 135 is obviously an adventure run, as is the Antarctic Marathon represented in this issue by a trio of feature stories. Adventure runs can be assembled and orchestrated by a race committee, thereby removing from the participants the obligation to put together their own self-contained operation from the ground up.

The second type of “adventure run” is a bit more ambitious in that it’s initiated by, organized by, sustained by, and enjoyed by the runner and supported by his or her friends. The adventure runner takes on both the role of the organizer and of the participant. (It’s a beautiful arrangement in that if you don’t like the way the run is organized, you can look in the mirror and castigate yourself.)

Adventure running constitutes the “beyond the beyond” for most runners.

It is a running place outside the ordinary, usually far from the madding crowd, often in exotic or outrageous settings.

Most runners will never nurse the urge to go so far beyond the well-organized and familiar. But there are the outlaws among us who, for whatever reason—curiosity, ego, bragging rights, an overwhelming wandering gene—seek out and embrace the outrageous and extreme.

Colorado’s Marshall Ulrich, a multiyear veteran of the Death Valley course, finished an out-of-character sixth in this year’s Hi-Tec race. Since he’s not the kind of a guy who rationalizes his “failures,” I’ll do it for for him. At 6:00 A.M. on July 1, two weeks before the Hi-Tec race, he left Badwater dragging behind him a 212-pound two-wheeled contraption that held everything he would need to complete the 150-mile course in a completely self-contained basis. No crew, no support, no sending friends to fetch more ice or water or supplies. If he didn’t have it with him, he didn’t have it. Temps in the desert reached 128 degrees. Desert winds, regularly in the 20 mph range, gusted to 40 mph. Decaying snowfields littered Mt. Whitney. Marshall reached the summit in 3 days, 5 hours, and 51 minutes! The conclusion from my end is that there’s no way he would have had time to recover sufficiently to do his usual outstanding job at the Hi-Tec race less than two weeks later.

But that’s the sign of the true adventurer runner: push the envelope until the stamp becomes unhinged. Adventure running is the end-all of the sport and lifestyle of running: an end-all that literally has no end. For such an incredibly simple sport, running truly has no bounds. You can literally and figuratively take it anywhere.

Yesterday was the 30th anniversary of Neil Armstrong’s historic footprint on the moon. As television stations replayed that momentous event, I found myself flashing to the many clips of astronauts confined in protective spacesuits gamboling on the moon, running as best they could in the awkwardly confining suits in the unfamiliar one-sixth gravity of the moon. There was a physical and spiritual joy in their running and cavorting around the gray surface of the moon—to date, these men are the ultimate adventure runners.

As we reach the end of another year and think through to the next, as the nights grow long and the cold of winter grips the terrain, consider the cornucopia of running adventures that beckon in the coming year. May all your runs in 2000 hold the hint and the satisfaction of adventure!

—Rich Benyo