Tag Archives: ultra race

Every 60 Minutes // Big Dog Backyard Ultra Race Recap

While dumping half a paycheck worth of diesel into Big Red, en route to Utah to volunteer at the Bear 100 [which was supposed to be my “A race” of the year], I impulsively tossed my name onto the waitlist for the Big Dog Backyard Ultra in Tennessee. Typing in my initials to sign away all liability + hitting “register” was weirdly exhilarating, even if it was only for the waitlist. For now.

Just after the Bear 100 racers took off from the start line I clicked through my inbox + hit “confirm” on my official Big Dog Backyard Ultra registration. *deep breath* Bigs is no “regular” ultra, it’s one of Laz’s races that was designed specifically to mess with your mind + force you to find your limits. I went out to Tennessee to crew the race two years ago when Jeremy + Johan battled it out to a tie at 49 hours. It was one helluva experience to crew — the atmosphere was awesome, Laz + his family were great hosts + it was incredible to witness the determination of runners hour after hour. Somehow that sounded fun enough to sign up for, with Jeremy jumping on board to crew because it gave him a chance to hang out with everyone he ran with a few years ago.

It all started this past January at the Winter OR Show. As usual a conversation with Landon made its way from gear talk to trail talk + it become obvious this needed to be the year he ran his first 100 mile race. Obvious, I tell you…because I will always encourage people to do the things that seem just stupid enough to be fun. By the time February rolled around we had both grabbed our spot on the list of Bear 100 registrants, hours before the race sold out. We were doing this! Or, that was the plan.