In an effort to keep myself accountable and to “build in public” as many do on Twitter, I’m going to share my training and thoughts in my build up to running the 2021 Barkley Marathons.

A thread:

1/ I’m out of shape right now.

That needs to chance quickly as the race is approximately 3 months away. If you don’t know what the Barkley Marathons is, there are some great documentaries on Amazon & YouTube you can search for.

2/ Essentially it’s a 100+ mile ultra marathon held in Frozen Head State Park in TN. It is a 5 identical looped course of unmarked trails and cross country scrambles over steep terrain.

Each loop is over 25 miles in length with +14,000 feet of climb.

3/ Just 15 people have finished the full five loops in the event’s 35 year history. You have 60 hours to finish and no one has finished under 52 hours.

Most years there are no finishers.

4/ I first toed the line at the Barkley in 2014, but I first read about it in 2005 or 2006 just as I was getting into running ultras. I found the website, read this poem and immediately added the event to my bucket list: