Western States is a JOKE!! - Kilian Jornet

Every ultra runner knows that WS is a fast course. So is Leadville. Neither one of them is considered hard compared to courses like the HURT or Hardrock.

And this my friends is why I despise Ultra running. Its not about performance, its just about "what's more difficult".

Hey, why not do the race with a cement block tied to your back? Maybe do it with barbed wire wrapped around your scrotum?

Yeah man.. other stuff just isn't hard core.

Hey Lexmark, I copy that.

I think he meant the trail surface is smooth like a road course. A road course that has 18,000' of uphill and 22,000' of downhill and is 100 mile long.

You try running it shithead if you think it's so f'ng fast.

As for the rest of you bozos who think Leadville is a fast course--try running it,the altitude is around 11,000 feet.

People don't "run" it you whining ultra-marathoning goober hack. People do this course while "wogging" 12-minuite miles. It is like a long, downhill road race with some altitude and a few rollers called hills.

Buffalo Billy wrote:

You try running it shithead if you think it's so f'ng fast.

As for the rest of you bozos who think Leadville is a fast course--try running it,the altitude is around 11,000 feet.

I don't think anyone but the most misinformed would claim WS is one of the hardest events. It's one of the most popular because of its history, the competitiveness and depth of the field, and its great, challenging course with lots of variety that still enables some relatively fast times. In Europe Sky Running events they ascend a lot of mountain sides on pseudo-trails and 20%+ grades. So yeah, compared to that, Western States is much more like REAL RUNNING.

Lol gotta love letsrun, where overweight 40 year olds on the internet tell us how easy a 100 mile race with 40,000 feet of elevation change at a mean altitude of 11,000 feet is

hotmomsyes wrote:

Lol gotta love letsrun, where overweight 40 year olds on the internet tell us how easy a 100 mile race with 40,000 feet of elevation change at a mean altitude of 11,000 feet is

This.

I think Kilian is a lot more legit than the last moron gave him credit for. As someone who has done WS100, I agree, it's not one of the toughest courses out there. That being said, it still has some difficult sections despite being pretty quick. People run it, as said above, for its prestige and history, not for it being super difficult on the scope of 100s.

lolzwut? wrote:

they would ameliorate the course record by hours

You were doing so well until this sentence.

But, I really wonder who would be the best ultra runners in the world if the sport had real money. E. Africans live at altitude, but rarely get up above 8,000 ft and do not do a lot of big climbing. And E. Africans live at the equator. They are not used to temperature extremes. Wouldn't Tibetan sherpas dominate? Or maybe some Peruvian shepherds?

I recently did a ten miler, pretty standard, and thought about a 100 mile race during it. Even at a job, 90 more miles sounded way beyond anything I could do.

East Africans would continue to dominate. The mountain running scene was dominated by the likes of Jonathan Wyatt (holds Mt. Washington CR), and then Obudu Mountain Run in Nigeria offered huge prize money and Wyatt was relegated to an also-ran as the Ugandans and Eritreans and everyone else just decimated him on the uphill climbs. Africans continued to infiltrate mountain running and continue to destroy the Europeans. Read Ricky Gates' blog, as it's fun to read when he lived like a king without Africans racing and then they started showing up spordically and started sweeping top positions.

It's a matter of fitness. Very difficult to find a Euro/American fitter than an elite-level 2h06 marathoner. Just look at Comrades for a hint of potential for Africans in ultras.

lolzwut? wrote:

Here's your ultra-marathoning reality, bitch.

Throw down a $3 million bounty for first with five-deep prize money in two yeaars and have twenty of the top Africans train for Western States. Fly them in and give them a week's stay plus $20K in appearance money so they get something out of the deal.

Then you will see what real RUNNERS can do on what amounts to a decent cross country course like Western States. Hint, they would ameliorate the course record by hours, have done their interviews, showered, banged your wife into oblivion (or daughters if she is too uggos), eaten two steaks chased by Dos Equis beer, and have boarded their flights back to Nairobi and Addis Ababa, all by the time your ultra heroes come lurching across the line.

Just because there are runners out there who would dominate ultras if there was financial incentive to do so, doesn't make such races any easier.

Seriously, 100 miles, 40k elevation change at 11k feet isn't easy. Dumb yes. Easy no.

Comparing mountain ultrarunning and Kilian Jornet (or Anton Krupicka, or Geoff Roes, et al) to top road marathoners (Mosop, Mutai, Lel, etc.) is like comparing an Olympic gymnast to Chris Sharma (arguably the world's top sport climber)---they're not even the same sports.

One is held in a fairly benign, predictable, controlled setting. The other takes place in the MOUNTAINS. Each require vastly different kinds of fitness and skill sets.

Stop being so threatened by a bunch of dudes who prefer to jog up and down mountains all day instead of run in flat circles.

No, it's the same sport, just one area of the sport (real running) is very competitive and the other (pain festivals) is not.

There is a much closer cross-over to running and ultra-running than gymnastics and sports climbing.

These Africans train in the mountains at 8000 feet and run tons of hills, which is higher than most. Like I said, give them the financial incentives and two years to prepare for this race, learning how to fuel up, etcetera, and they would obliterate (by hours and hours) all of today's current ultra runners at Western States.

PS: Kilian Jornet called this "like a road race" so it isn't THAT brutal. Also check out how the Africans do on gnarly cross country courses. They kill everyone.

Why would an East African want to risk his relatively short road racing career by taking part in such a onerous and unprofitable endeavor?