Luckily, I follow bloggers who are more knowledgeable than myself, so I was excited and surprised when reading irunfar.com and saw an article about Kilian Jornet making an attempt at the speed record for a continuous running of the 165 mile trail. Unfortunately, I read about this attempt a day after it happened so I was unable to go watch or participate. However, I was able to email some of the people involved and watch the great videos documenting the event.
After reading and watching the videos on this amazing run I was inspired to look into completing the TRT 165 myself. Although I knew I was nowhere near ready to run it continuously, I made the decision to attempt the TRT165 by breaking it into 8 sections (from trailhead to trailhead) in 2010. It will also be good training for my Tahoe Rim Trail Endurance 50Miler this summer.
Originally I was going to do the TRT165 solo, but as I discussed it with others, a few brave souls (heya Jim!)expressed an interest in joining me and being part of the elite number of people (only 1028) who have actually finished the entire trail.
What follows is information for those people who will be doing part of (or the entire) trail.
Examples
Here are a couple of blogs from others who have done the TRT165:
http://turistrt.blogspot.com/
http://runlaketahoe.blogspot.com/2008/08/running-rim-trail.html
Calendar
If for some reason we are unable to complete a section of trail then we will do it on another open weekend during the summer (Sept/Oct). However, we WILL complete the TRT in 2010. Calendar spreadsheet with more information listed here.
The Different Sections
1-2 Tahoe City-Brockway
2-3 Brockway-Tahoe Meadows
3-4 Tahoe Meadows-Spooner Summit
4-5 Spooner Summit-Kingsbury Grade
5-6 Kingsbury Grade-Big Meadows
6-7 Big Meadows-Echo Lakes
7-8 Echo Lakes-Barker Pass
8-1 Barker Pass-Tahoe City
How Fast?
Our goal is to run most of this trail with a time from 10-18minutes/mile (depending on terrain) with an average of 15min/mile. Currently, only the June 29 (or 30th or july 1st) section will be hiked.
Transportation
We will either dropoff a car at each trailhead or we will have someone pick us up. Specifics for each run will be decided closer to that particular date.
Water
Hydration is always important during outdoor activities, but absolutely vital during a high energy event which will last 3-14 hours. Since weight is a consideration, I would rather not bring any more water than needed to complete each run. So, the plan is to pack the minimum amount needed and supplement it using water sources along the trail whenever possible. I will probably be using either the Steripen or Aquamira drops for treatment of the water (more on this later).
My water consumption averages around 1 Liter/hour, so that is what I will be using for my estimate of water needs.
Here is a list of the water sources along the trail.
What to Bring
Obviously, this list will vary for each person, but this is what I plan on bringing (more or less). I have compiled it from a few sources, but the majority of it is froma spreadsheet made by Peter Lubbers who is a 2 time Tahoe Triple winner and successfully ran the entire TRT 165. I will have 1 extra running hydration pack available as a backup if someone needs it.
The list is on the 2nd tab of this spreadsheet.
