- M
On July 25th, I'll be competing in my first backyard ultramarathon in Concord NC. Alongside the race, I’m raising money for Mental Health America, a non-profit dedicated to the promotion of mental health, well-being, and condition prevention, and I would love your support for the cause!
I included a bunch of detail about the race format and my inspiration below, but my goal is to either win the race as the last man standing (unlikely), or complete one 4.167 mile 'yard' for every $100 I raise. So if you want to support me in running as far as I can, or if you hate my guts and want to make me suffer ;), you should donate!
The starting goal of $700 will put the total distance at DNF at 29.169 miles - or just over a full marathon - and with the elevation map being as brutal as it is (I didn't look up the terrain before signing up...not my finest decision), 7 yards feels like a good goal.
What is a Backyard Ultra?
A backyard ultra is a last-person-standing race format where runners complete a 4.167 mile loop (called a ‘yard’) every hour, on the hour, until one person remains. The race does not end after any predetermined distance, as runners will continue completing yard after yard, hour after hour, until the winning ‘finisher’ completes one more yard than the second place ‘assist’ (lot of jargon in these races).
The specific 4.167 mile distance is selected so that runners who complete 24 yards in 24 hours will have run 100 miles. If a runner cannot complete the yard within the hour, or is not in the starting corral ready to begin the next yard at the hour mark, they DNF and are out of the race.
My Inspiration
Why am I doing this race? If my friends were writing this they would say because I'm crazy (fair enough lol), but there are so many amazing people I can point to as inspiration for the madness to come on July 25th. The first of which is Mike Egan.
Mike Egan is a US Marine veteran who lost both of his legs in an IED blast in Afghanistan - but Mike didn't allow his tragedy to stop him from pursuing his dreams. When I became interested in ultramarathons at the beginning of this year, one of the first of many races that overtook my Instagram feed was the BPN backyard ultra. At that race, Mike competed in a wheelchair, pushing and pulling himself through the muddy course for 26 yards before his wheelchair broke and he was forced to DNF. The videos and pictures from Mike's race are awe-inspiring, and his backyard ultra attempt made me so curious to see what I'd be capable of in the format.
Rachel Entrekin is the second person I can point to as an inspiration for this wild endeavor. Rachel won the Cocodona 250, a 250 mile ultra in the desert of Arizona, by smashing the course record and finishing in just over 56 hours. While her race and performance itself was incredible, it was what she said in the interview after the race that truly inspired me.
"During the race, the mantra I kept saying was 'why not you?' I felt a lot of imposter syndrome when I was out front at mile 50. Like 'what are you doing, like you are going to blow up, you're going out too fast or too hard', all this negative self talk. And I was like, 'why not you though'? If anyone's going to win this, why can't it be you?"
For me, this backyard ultra attempt is pretty scary. I have absolutely no idea what, if anything, I can do on this course and in this format, but that fear of venturing into the unknown is also exciting. I can't wait to step on the line and see what I'm capable of, and Rachel's quote is a stark reminder that the adage "anything can happen" can also mean good things can happen.
The final, and most impactful inspiration for this race was an Instagram post by Edwin Martin. Edwin is an endurance athlete from Charleston SC who livestreamed himself running for 24 hours on a treadmill to raise money for suicide awareness and prevention. I included a link to his post after the run below (fair warning, its hard to watch and read without tearing up).
Edwin's run is what convinced me to do this backyard ultra for more than just myself, as he was able to raise $10k for the cause. I'm a big proponent of New Year's resolutions, and one of mine this year was to find more ways to give back, and I'd like this to be one of the ways I do that this year.
Edwin's decision to raise money for suicide awareness and prevention was also uniquely impactful for me. I rarely tell this story, but when I was in 7th grade, one of my close friends attempted suicide while we were on a Skype video call. I remember him calling our friends' group chat well past midnight, and when I answered the call he was holding up a sign that said "I can't do this anymore" before he quickly downed two bottles of pills. Luckily, that was a non-lethal dose of sleeping pills and he ended up being ok, but I remember feeling so helpless and out-of-my-depth in that moment. What my friend needed in that moment was a mental health professional, not a scared 7th grader screaming at his monitor and trying to call an ambulance.
Zak and I fell out of touch a long time ago (it was hard to stay close after that, and he didn't live nearby), but I heard from a mutual friend a few years back that he is no longer with us.
I'm doing this race not just for myself, but also for Zak, for my friend crashing on my couch as I write this trying to figure his life out again, for my friends who've expressed hopelessness and feeling like things are never going to work out no matter what they do or how hard they try. This race is about perseverance, about keeping it moving regardless of how dire the situation gets, and I hope I can give others a fraction of the inspiration that Mike, Rachel, and Edwin have given me.
My Running Journey
Although distance running and ultramarathon-ing is a new hobby of mine, my running journey started 14 years ago when I signed up for cross country as a freshman in high school. I was not very good back then, only running a 24 minute 5k and 6:15 mile my freshman year, but running quickly became my outlet, and after four years of hard training, I ran 17:32 in the 5k and 4:48 in the mile.
When I came to UNC for college, I joined the club running team (club or die!) and made lifelong friends on the team, but I stopped taking running as seriously. After a tough end to my high school XCTF career, I just didn't enjoy running anymore, and I found new interests and athletic pursuits in the gym and in recreational sports.
But this past winter, things shifted back again. As much as I enjoyed lifting weights in the gym, I realized that I wasn't passionate about lifting in the same way I once was about running. The allure of benching 225 for the first time never quite moved me, and I noticed that whenever life was good, I'd stop swiping into my local O2 fitness.
What I missed, and what I always loved, was racing. Something about the experience of stepping on the line in a colorful singlet and giving absolutely everything you have for the next however many minutes or miles was so special to me. Sure races are a test of your training and fitness compared to others, but I loved a different aspect of it. For me, racing was always an internal battle against that inner voice telling you to stop and that you're not good enough to run whatever time you're aiming for. It's asking yourself the question "how much do you want this and how hard are you willing to push yourself today?" and it's an amazing feeling to answer that call by pushing yourself to the physical limit.
And with that realization, so began what my friends have since dubbed "Raul's Ridiculous Race Series" (pics above). Over the winter months as I started getting back into running, 5ks turned into 10ks, and 10ks into half marathons, until eventually I worked my way up to a full marathon and finished the Wilmington Marathon on 2/28. Two weeks later, I was back in the saddle again running the Tobacco Road Marathon on 3/15; and after tackling the Asheville Half Marathon on 3/21, I finally tried my hand at an ultramarathon, finishing the MST 50k on 4/12.
Hedonic adaptation is a terrible thing, and now that I have a 50k under my belt, I'll be testing myself again with a 50-miler on 6/6 just outside of Charleston, in preparation for this backyard ultra on 7/25.
*Before and after my first ultra, the Mountains-to-Sea Trail 50k. The race was an out-and-back on the mountains-to-sea trail from just outside of Eno River State Park in Durham NC, to Falls Lake in Raleigh NC, and back.
The Fundraiser
A 'yard' for every $100. As cliche as it sounds, this was just a random thing I dreamt about one night that got stuck in my head. I have weird dreams.
And finally, why Mental Health America? Well for starters it’s one of the highest rated mental health charities on charitywatch.org (yes, I started there), and it supports a wide range of programs and initiatives that tackle a variety of mental health challenges. Whether it be preventative care, advocacy, information and awareness, or academic research, Mental Health America funds and supports so many different programs in an effort to improve mental health outcomes in the US, and I'd like to support them on their mission with this fundraiser.
If you are able to and would like to support the cause, please do. It would mean the world to me to hit the goal!
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And follow my training on Strava!
Organizer
Mental Health America
Beneficiary