I couldn’t even guess how many of these races (ultramarathons) he’s finished. I doubt Beat has any idea what the number is, either. It’s in the hundreds. Beat’s Ultrasignup results capture 173 races, and that doesn’t even include all of the hardest ones (the 1,000-mile Iditarod Trail Invitational x7 or the Petite Trotte à Léon x7) or the obscure ones. It’s so many. I can’t even comprehend it. I burned out in a half-frozen whimper after just a decade participating in long foot races, and with just 50 races on my official list (this has since stretched to 51 this past spring after a four-year hiatus between finishes.)
I don’t understand how my husband keeps going.
Perhaps it’s the sheer incomprehension of such large numbers that makes Beat’s races seem so mundane. You know what they say — One birth is a miracle. One thousand births are a statistic. Either way, I was not feeling the requisite admiration as my Subaru Outback idled in a stagnant cloud of dust on County Road 2. I was just a quarter-mile past the turnoff where a sign indicated that the road has transitioned to four-wheel drive only. Two-wheel drive vehicles and trailers are “not recommended.” Of course, everyone crewing a Hardrock runner will brave this road regardless of whether they’re driving a Toyota Prius or a 1979 Ford Pinto. I was already stuck behind a Toyota Camry clocking a cool 4 mph. Or less. My odometer registered zero motion.
A full five minutes earlier, just as I arrived at the turnoff to the 4WD section, I paused to consider my options. “Google says it’s just 4 miles to Animas Forks. I wonder if I should just stuff Beat’s things in a backpack and walk?”
I did the math. Shoot, not enough time to walk. Could I run? With a 50-liter backpack? With 17 miles and 6,500 feet of climbing on my own legs from climbing up Tower Mountain earlier that day, and with only a box of Annie’s Mac and Cheese that I cooked on a camp stove and wolfed down in my hotel room to refuel? Signs pointed to no. Reluctantly, I turned the steering wheel left to take my place in the creeping procession.
The road to Animas Forks is awful. It’s all but paved in boulders — some the size of babyheads, some the size of microwaves — and so narrow that oncoming traffic can only pass in intervals while everyone else waits. There’s a steep drop into the river on the east side of the road and vertical rock outcroppings on the left. In other words, your typical Colorado dirt road. Even good drivers probably bump along these roads at 10 mph. I don’t know. I’ve never tried it. The only thing worse than driving is technical driving, which is why I will never understand the appeal of recreational four-wheeling. When I am driving at a speed I can walk, I will choose to walk.
The line of rental vehicles with Texas plates stopped to let an oncoming line of cars go by. We waited for at least five more minutes. Creeping along, we came to a camper van that had burst its oil pan and was just sitting high-centered on a boulder in the middle of the road. It was difficult to get around on either side. Many were reluctant to try. Desperately, I scanned ahead for any place I could pull over and park. “Is there still time to walk? Maybe there’s still time to walk.”
But there wasn’t time to walk. So I crept along, road rage simmering in my gut as I swore out loud. “How hard is it? How hard is it to drive over these rocks? It’s not hard!”
Nearly an hour had passed on that four-mile stretch of road when I finally slithered around my last Texas plate and encountered Beat. He was approaching the aid station after descending from Handies Peak. I should have walked! But at least I was going to beat him to the checkpoint. “See you there!” I called out my window, careful not to slow down or give any appearance of offering aid outside an aid station, which got a top runner disqualified a few years ago.
Having left Silverton — ten miles back — well before sunset, it was fully dark by the time I pulled into the Animas Forks townsite. The narrow road was choked with tents and rows of vehicles. This, too, was chaos, which was to be expected. Aid station volunteers did their best to direct me to a site where my car didn’t actually fit, and which took so long to park that Beat arrived at the tents before me. Since I didn’t have “eyes on my runner,” the aid station bouncer would not let me in, even though I insisted that he had to be there already. For several minutes I waited in vain before finally being rescued by a fellow Boulder-area (well, Gilpin County) mountain resident who recognized me — Jenn.
Jenn ushered me toward Beat, who was tired but happy. He was feeling okay. This amazed me, as he had only just recovered from six weeks of giardia — he’d only finished his round of antibiotics two days earlier. I could see some reluctance as the night clamped down, and Beat lingered for a while with multiple cold cans of ginger beer and the single slab of hot food I could convince him to eat (I think it was a quesadilla. I don’t remember.) I went back to the car to grab Beat’s favorite vest, and again, the bouncer nearly refused to let me back into the tent. Beat and I left the aid station at the same time — him walking and me driving through the gauntlet of camper vans that seemed settled in for the night. By the time I passed him, he’d covered nearly a mile.
I nearly lost my shit on the return trip. Okay, I did lose my shit. I got stuck behind a large white truck — far more capable than my Subaru Outback — that was inexplicably carrying four passengers in the open bed. The truck stopped — fully stopped — at every single boulder the driver encountered. The overall pace could not have been more than 2 mph. But the time I found a narrow corridor to skirt around the truck, I gunned it, screeching and swirling up dust. I nearly went off the road into the river. I did not care. I drove the rest of the bumpy three miles clocking at least 15 mph, bouncing violently, wondering if I, too, would crack the undercarriage. I did not care. Usually, stressful driving gives me panic attacks. Road rage was a welcome diversion.
Beat knows crewing is not my favorite thing. I used to volunteer enthusiastically to help him at his races — after all, it’s a great excuse to go hiking somewhere new between aid station check-ins. And I enjoy spectating the drama of the race as it’s happening. But the years have dragged on, I admit.
“I have crewed so many of these races and you have never crewed for me, not even once,” I whined to him earlier this month. This is because I rarely run a race that Beat isn’t running, and if I do, it’s usually because he’s off doing something much longer. It’s also because I don’t like the notion of using a crew or pacers in my own races. I just prefer to make all of my own decisions, even if they’re bad decisions. And I don’t like feeling beholden to anyone else. If I’m in a bad mood, I don’t want to talk to anyone else. So it’s not Beat’s fault that he’s never crewed me. But it bugs me that he has no idea what crewing entails. All of the driving, all of the waiting, all of the timing, all of the wondering. He has never had to endure this, at least not since I met him 13 years ago.
I admit to feeling resentment as I started the 90-minute round-trip drive to Ouray around 1 a.m. I think I had dozed for a few minutes. I wasn’t sure. I set an alarm with plenty of time to spare in case a rockslide came down on Highway 550 or something like that. Beat doesn’t really need me at his races. He can walk the entire 1,000-mile Iditarod Trail without aid — why would he need hand-holding in a mere 48 hours? But Beat likes to see me at intervals, and there’s also no reason not to make the trip. I wanted the opportunity to hike in the San Juans, after all. And I enjoy seeing Beat in his element. But the fact that Beat doesn’t need me — dosen’t really need me — that, I admit, makes it hard.
Beat looked surprisingly fresh in Ouray. It had been a particularly hot year for the Hardock 100, with temperatures spiking into the upper 80s — almost unheard of at these altitudes. The heat clamped down on his already sour stomach, so he found it hard to take in calories. The cool air of the night had revived him, and he was moving well.
“You’ve been keeping up with Daniel since you left Animas Forks, exactly two hours behind him,” I urged Beat. After a couple more cans of ginger beer and an entire burger with ketchup, he was off.
I drove back to Silverton because I wanted to sleep in a bed. But I could only snooze for about two hours before it was time to rise and drive the 2.5 hours round trip to Telluride. It was by then 7 a.m. and the line for coffee was out the door. I don’t even drink full-strength coffee anymore but I really, really needed it. I waited in line for 20 minutes and then time was up — no coffee for me. The morning drive around the San Juan Mountains was lovely but interminable.
Beat looked more haggard at Telluride. It was understandable. He’d been up all night running over all of those mountains. He’d covered 72 miles in the race. The heat of the day was cranking back up; it was already 82 degrees at 9 a.m. It was tough to feel sorry for myself given what he was doing. He promised he’d fill up on calories but only ate one sliver of French toast and a bite of quesadilla. I was able to ply him with more ginger beers and ice for his hydration bladder.
“Climb to Oscars,” he mumbled between sips. “Daniel thinks it’s the worst climb of the course.” It’s certainly one of the longest, with nearly 5,000 feet of elevation gain. He’d have to tackle the beast in this heat. Beat asked me what I was going to do with my day. He thought I should return to Silverton and hike Little Giant. But I couldn’t muster the energy to drive all the way back around the San Juans. So instead I made myself a small lunch, waited another 20 minutes, and shortcut the course to ensure the Telluride volunteers would not accuse me of attempting unregulated pacing. Then I started up Oscars.
The first two miles of trail were mobbed with hikers, cyclists, and even dirt skateboarders on their way to a Bear Creek waterfall. I was irritated and couldn’t imagine how the tired runners felt about these crowds, but you can’t complain about traffic when you are traffic. Luckily, the route veered off onto a loose, narrow ribbon of singletrack that climbed steeply out of the canyon. It was gorgeous up there. I don’t know why Daniel thinks this part is so awful. Of course, 72 miles of the same old grind with much more ahead does that to a person.
The heat of the day cranked higher, with not even a hint of a cloud to obstruct the sun’s UV rays that seemed to burn through the thin fabric of my sun hoodie. I started passing Hardrock runners in various states of repose — laying in streams or filling up water bottles with snow. One runner had plopped down next to a snowbank with the thousand-yard stare fixed on his face.
“Are you in the race?” he asked as I passed.
“No, I couldn’t finish Hardrock if my life depended on it,” I replied.
“Oh,” he said, sounding dejected. “Do you know if this is the right way to the pass?”
There was only one trail as far as I knew, but I pulled out my GPS to check. “Oscars is up that way,” I said, pointing south. “About a thousand more feet of climbing.” I didn’t try to guess how many more miles, as distance isn’t so important at Hardrock. The runner probably felt the same, as he didn’t ask.
“A thousand feet. Okay.”
I climbed a terrifying snowfield to tag Oscars Pass. I don’t know why I did that. Perhaps because all of the runners were doing it. But then I had to downclimb the steep, still-partially frozen snow far above a rock-strewn cirque that was pulling at my vertigo. Still woozy from the fear, I started down the valley toward Bridal Creek, where I hoped to loop my route. I vaguely remember this faint Jeep road from 2012, but I also remembered spending a lot of time off-trail, searching for the path. This year, the bowl was filled with snow patches and ankle-deep bogs. I consulted my GPS often but still struggled to keep to the trail.
As Bridal Veil Creek descends, it cuts a deep gorge into the valley. Staying on route becomes non-optional — any overland travel is likely to end in a cliff. Indeed, I boot-skied down a snowfield to arrive at a cliff with seemingly no way around. GPS said the road was here, but I couldn’t find it. I felt despondent about this. Damn it, I’m going to have to climb back up to Oscars and I only have two granola bars left. At least there’s lots of drinking water to go around.
But then I remember Beat, out slogging his 102-mile grind. This was a cakewalk in comparison. I needed to stop being such a whiner.
Happily, I eventually did parse out the road, which was mechanically cut into the gorge beside dramatic cascades. Thank goodness for construction vehicles and dynamite! I made my way to classic Bridal Veil Falls, where the now-crowded road switchbacked down, down, into the inferno. I couldn’t muster the wherewithal to run. I kept checking the race tracker to ensure I had time to make it back to Silverton before Beat.
Then there was more driving. A bunch of time passed and I may have snoozed. I don’t remember. Finally, at 2 a.m. I was stumbling back out into the still-hot darkness. The finish line was quiet. All of the fanfare from earlier in the day had subsided. Just the way Beat likes it. There were a few other people waiting for their runners, along with Dale, the run director, who greets everyone who kisses the rock. I watched the darkness for Beat’s familiar gait. When I saw his headlamp bobbing, my heart swelled.
As Beat collected his prize from the only other person at the finish line who cared even a little, he beamed. That smile — drooping with fatigue and yet glowing with all the luminescence of high-altitude sunlight — I relish that smile. That smile was why I fell in love with Beat. Seeing him so happy never gets old.
And that, I suppose, is why we both keep going back.
It is amazing how many runs Beat has done.
Over the weekend I was in Geraardsbergen, Belgium, for the start of the TransContinental Race and over breakfast spoke to an American over for the race ( and a ‘13 Tour Divide vet). He was saying about how we have only limited amount of endurance races in us as they are so mentally and physically tough and then I read this piece on Beat.
I'm so sorry I missed you when I was volunteering at Animus. I must've been busy with another runner. I know, crewing is so stressful. I'm thinking of having my husband stay home rather than trying to crew me at RRR in September. I'm glad you got to experience the Telluride trails. I just did that loop two days ago. Did you see that Claire Bannwarth of France came to Silverton solo and did HR without crew or pacers--just drop bags--placed fifth, then went to Tahoe a few days later and did the same thing to win the 200 outright? Totally inspiring, especially the crew-less part. BTW I love the vintage Diablo shirt. I didn't do Diablo that year in 2008 but did that one a different year. I'm amazed how much our lives overlap! Congrats to Beat & you.