High Lonesome 100 Recap

I realize HiLo isn’t one of the premier U.S. ultras, but it looks really pretty and it's on my bucket list 🤷

This was another record-breaking weekend for North American ultrarunning (despite High Lonesome not being one of the premier U.S. races), but this time just for the women’s race. While I didn’t know much about Becca Bramley before this weekend, if she can take a few seconds off of a Rachel Entrekin record, she’s someone that should be on all of our radars.

The men’s race, however, wasn’t able to overcome Jeff Colt’s ghost:

Weather

Overall, this year’s High Lonesome was very similar to last year’s race, in terms of temperature. The temperatures looked rather pleasant, once the runners hit elevation:

This first chart is a maximum-only heatmap; what did temperatures look like across the day? I’m realizing this chart isn’t the best because I’m only sampling at the aid stations, perhaps I should work on a more granular chart. This is suggesting weather was similar between Baldwin and St Elmo, despite two climbs which would have been much cooler:

However, an aerial heatmap does a better job at showing temperatures across the entire course:

Carnage Charts

As these high altitude races are incredibly difficult, there was a lot of carnage in the men’s and women’s races:

Only 5 of the original top 10 through the first Raspberry aid station finished in the top 10 of the men’s race. Props to Kevin and Don who persisted through a difficult course.

Similar story in the women’s race, only 5 of the original top 10 through the first Raspberry aid station ended up finishing in the women’s top 10. Respect for Chrissy, Laura, Madeline, and Samatha for persisting to the end!

Rally Charts

Alex Galasso wins the HiLo Nick Curry award:

So much so, that I had to exclude him in order to read the other labels for podium spots 1-9:

Although Ryan Sullivan was in first place through the Cottonwood aid station (31.5 miles), it looks like the podium wasn’t set until Raspberry 2, 92.7 miles into the race!

In the women’s field, Shanda Demorest had an equally-impressive rally:

Becca and Isabella shuffled around 1st and 2nd place through Tin Cup (41.7 miles), where Becca took the lead for the rest of the day. Salynda rallied between Tin Cup and Hancock (49.6 miles), at which point the women’s podium was set for the last 50 miles of the race.

Since both Becca and Isabella finished in the top 10 overall (and Becca 3rd), I felt it was approach to show the overall top 10 rally chart as well:

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Edit: Chris McBride asked to see some analysis of people rallying to stay in front of cut-offs. It was a really good idea; I’m not sure I fully like what I came up with, but I’ll continue to refine it for future races.

Here’s what I’m calling a chasing cutoffs chart, intended to show what completion / drops looked like through each aid station:

Tin Cup to Hancock seems to be the most difficult segment (in terms of overall drops, n=19) followed by St. Elmo 1 to Cottonwood (n=10) then Purgatory to Monarch Pass (n=9).

And for those chasing the final cutoffs, here’s what the last four hours for runners entering Raspberry 2 (92.7 miles) looked like: