Few knew what to expect from the first running of this backyard-style event with steep vertical climbs at Mount Ascutney
By Nate Weitzer
November is typically quiet in rural Vermont. It’s stick season and all, with limited foliage, icy trails, and ski resorts sitting idly in darkness while awaiting the first consistent snowfall.
So when residents of Brownsville started to see headlamps lighting up the slopes of Mount Ascutney on cold November nights, it must have ignited some curiosity. When those sporadic lights turned into a veritable procession on Saturday, November 22, it should have become clear that something was happening on the highest peak in Windsor County.
In fact, the community-owned recreational area had become host to the first vertical backyard ultra in the region, Mount Ascutney Vertical, with determined New England crushers ready to set a lofty standard in the format.
Hiking through rain, fog, snow squalls, sleet, and 15 hours of darkness per day, 24-year-old Conor Brown repeated the 1,209-foot climb up and down Ascutney 90 times over 90 hours from Saturday morning to Tuesday evening, with an assist from 63-year-old Bill Tidd, who got off course on his 90th lap and was disqualified.
Brown’s effort required 108,810 feet of vertical gain over 202.5 miles, and the Manchester, New Hampshire resident was one of many athletes to push new personal bests in the days leading up to Thanksgiving.
“We’re all about choosing your own adventure,” said Eli Burakian, who directed the event along with Justin Chapman. The longtime friends recently founded Northeast Trail Adventures and Burakian lives in Brownsville, so he was able to work with Ascutney Outdoors to host their first race at his local mountain.
“We wanted to make it not necessarily about who finishes, but to celebrate everyone’s achievements. I think that’s the way to do it. In a typical ‘backyard’ everyone is a DNF [did not finish] except one person. I understand that, it makes sense, but I feel horrible sending people home with a DNF when everyone’s doing something incredible.”
For those unfamiliar with backyard ultramarathons, the typical format requires runners to complete a 4.167-mile loop (typically on flat terrain) every hour, on the hour, until only one finisher is able to do so. The distance became standardized because it adds up to 100 miles over 24 hours, so Burakian dreamed of a 1,209-foot climb every hour, which would equal the height of Mount Everest (29,032) when repeated 24 times.
Other ski areas have offered Everest challenges in a 24-hour period, but typically participants are allowed to take the chairlift down to preserve their legs. Not at Ascutney.
“No one thought this race was going to surpass 36 hours,” said Amber Constant, who set the women’s bar at 64 laps with 77,736 feet of gain.
“Just looking at other [backyard formats in the area] that haven’t gone much longer, and then you add some vertical, and you think it’s definitely not going that far. So when [the final four entrants] were still going on Monday, I think we all had to tap in mentally because we thought we’d be going home by then.”
The event directors and their crew of volunteers thought so too. Chapman had work engagements, Burakian planned to drive to Philadelphia for Thanksgiving on Tuesday, and they only rented the Ascutney Outdoors building at the base of the course for two nights, but the volunteer-based organization was happy to keep the facilities available as the legend continued to grow.
Students from Brownsville came to spectate Monday afternoon, trail running enthusiasts from near and far showed up to offer support and crew the last few people standing, and the event became a talking point for national trail running outlets.
“It was incredible,” said Brown, who has run Bubba’s Backyard Ultra three times, including this October, and set records on the Uncanoonuc Mountains in Goffstown two years ago with about 50 summits of each mountain in separate 24-hour challenges.
“I didn’t know how many people would be watching this event. The inspiration actually grew, and I was getting emotional at times. Who knew a bunch of people would be watching us go up and down a mountain.”
The course offered two options: Hike to the turnaround point 1,209 feet up Asctuney and back down, or complete three laps of the 400-foot climb under the T-Bar lift within the hour.
While the shorter laps offered a more gradual descent and the morale boost of seeing the base camp twice during the hour, it required the repetition of a steep grassy slope with a max grade of 40-plus degrees. Still, most athletes opted for the short loops throughout the cold nights because the upper mountain had a few icy spots, and the long, hard-packed descent could lead to more impact on their joints without switching movement methods.
Tidd, who finished 59th at Tor Des Geants 330k in September, and holds the supported New Hampshire 4,000-footers FKT, mostly stuck to the shorter laps. Brown only did long laps. Constant trained on the long laps and wanted to avoid short laps at all costs, but with an injury history stemming from hard falls on ice, she switched to short laps after about 41,000-feet of climbing.
“When you’re in an ultra, you have so many endorphins that you’re not really feeling the pain, but you can tell something’s wrong, so I just pushed through it,” Constant said, referring to a knee injury that eventually forced her to stop. “I had pushed through so much during training, I was on fumes.”
Despite a surgical mishap that leaves her with only 65 percent of her muscle mass in a leg with no sciatic nerve, Constant has done some incredible things, becoming the first woman to complete the New Hampshire Appalachian Trail segment in a single push, the first person to do the White Mountains 100 as an out-and-back, and 10 repeats of Mount Liberty and Flume for over 40,000-feet of gain in winter.
Yet between laps, when she wasn’t trying to get 30 seconds of sleep, or refuel, or tape her ailments, Constant would consistently mention that this was the hardest thing she’s ever done.
“Every lap should feel very achievable. Each part is achievable, it’s the sum of the whole. It all adds up,” said Burakian, an accomplished trail runner who proudly notes that his kids Ani, 9, and Levon, 11, did a couple laps at the start of the event.
“But being with others helps to push you further. These guys proved something incredible and set the standard.”
Although his company lost money on the race, Burakian is thrilled with how the community rallied. Recounting the results, the photographer and guidebook author notes 68 people climbed the elevation of Mount Washington (6,288), 38 reached the 12-hour mark to equate the height of California’s Mount Whitney (14,505), and 20 completed the Everest challenge before calling it.
The event also included a “cash lap” during which Lyle Cordes ran up and down the course in a mind-blowing 21 minutes, and had prizes for the “vert gobbler,” i.e. the athlete that did the most additional, and optional, 200-foot climbs to reach the old patrol shack on Ascutney (just above the regular turnaround), which Rob Rives did on all 24 of his laps.
It was more than a marathon for the final few athletes, and their dedicated crew, who had to stay up most of the night preparing for aid between laps, or talking on the phone with their racers to keep them awake and on course.
Repeating the same climb for days on end might seem like torture to some, but the vertical enthusiasts of the northeast have made it into a community. Many of the crew and participants trained at Ascutney for weeks prior to the event, and with Northeast Trail Adventures planning to host it annually (and add another vertical backyard in New England next year), the mountain should once again come alive next fall during the darkest part of the year.
Nate Weitzer is an avid trail runner, backcountry skier, and mountain climber living in North Woodstock, New Hampshire, where he writes for multiple publications. Over the past 20 years he’s thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail, a portion of the Pacific Crest Trail, climbed Mt. Rainier, Adams, Baker, Hood, and skied off multiple volcanoes. Weitzer has summitted the NH 48 in all four seasons, finished the ADK 46er list while working trail maintenance in the Keene Valley area, and completed the Colorado 14ers over the course of four summers. He’s written about the inaugural White Mountains 100 and ultrarunner Lexi Jackson for Northeast Explorer.
