CROWTHER WINS ANOTHER BIG ONE! A relatively unknown to most…until Sunmart, Greg Crowther wiped out a stellar field to win the US Championship 100K at Mad City in 7hrs 14min. Scott Jurek put together another solid performance running 7:32. Kevin Setnes rounded out the top 3 and smoked the older boys running 7:50. Julie Udchacon won the womens race and finished 4th overall in 8:09. The next three finishers were women making them the real winners of all! Crowther takes home $2000 making him the richest Ultrarunner on earth with the exception of Yannis Kouros, the WGUR. Looks like Crowther is in the running for Ultrarunner of the Year…Meltzer better get moving! Congrats to all! 3 scrapes! baaahhhhhh!

Sign up on-line for the Wasatchspeedgoat “Get High” 50k rugged trail race through Snowbird and Alta Ski Resorts. The race takes place 7/21/07 at the Snowbird Tram deck, get ready to run through the tunnel~race app

NOTES FROM THE GOATS:KYLE SKAGGS CHUCKS UP ANOTHA AT THE CHUCKANUT 50K! Kyle Skaggs continues to fly under the radar to win another Ultra in a closely contested race coming from behind on the last leg to beat Matthew Simms at the tape by a scant 2:20, running 4:10.13. Hal Koerner rounded out the top five finishing in 4:20 with Josh Mulkey and Mike Wedemeyer just in front. Melanie Bos won the women’s race in a fast time of 4:58. The conditions were wet and muddy with driving rain the entire race. Uli Steidl’s record stands firm at 3:42! We don’t think Uli’s record will fall any year soon, He’s too fast!

Three scrapes for Kyle and Melanie!

WasatchSpeedGoat “Get High” 50k Race Application

A FEW RACE NOTES FROM THE DESK OF THE GOATS. Scott Jurek returned to Copper Canyon to run with the indians and turned out a stellar performance winning the 47 mile adventure in a scant 6:32. Scott donated his winnings back to the locals, he wasn’t able to bring corn back to Seattle from Mexico. Hal Koerner came close to taking down Brandon Sybrowsky’s record at the Old Pueblo 50 mile running 7:15 and change making it the third fastest time along the mexican border. Lewis Taylor had a great run in the mud as did Beverly Anderson-Abbs to win the Way Too Cool 50K in 3:41 and 4:19 respectively. Next up will be Scott Mason running with the Buffalos on Antelope Island next weekend. Snort, Snort, two scrapes! Wahsatchspeedgoat!

« WasatchSpeedGoat “Get High” 50k Application

On a Red Hot day in Moab, Utah this past weekend, a stellar field showed up to chase a Speedgoat. A few runners were trapped on their adventure from Denver when 100mph winds closed I-70 and sent a few runners home. Meltzer and Hector Martinez (a 2:18 road marathon to his credit) played cat and mouse for the first 20 miles until the real hill up to Gold Bar Rim pushed Hector back. Karl took off on the more technical terrain and prevailed in 4:25. Torrid Torrence closed hard to finish second in 4:44 using his “local knowledge” to stay on the well marked, but hard to follow route from Gold Bar to Poison Spider. Africa threw in another of her stellar performances…textbook style finishing near 5 hours. Cheryl Pfeil, in classic form finished her longest run of 34 miles in socks only from mile 26 to 34 to take home the fresh pair of La Sportiva shoes. We’ll have full results posted as soon as we know. 3 scrapes for Karl, Cheryl and Darcy! baaaaaahhhhhhh!!!

Matt Estes and Krissy Moehl smashed course records at the HURT 100 this past weekend. Benign course conditions made it even faster running 20:43 and 26:15. As Matt always does, ran a smart race and very even splits through the 5 laps, while Krissy ran controlled all the way in her first 100 without a pacer. Meltzer got bored after 100k and had to settle for the 100k record running 12:37. It was ultimately Matt’s day and Karl really had no chance of chasing Matt down once he got away. Matt’s performance will go down as one of the best in 2007, even though it is only January. Look for Matt to go for his 2nd Massannutten win in May!
Congrats to both!

Wahsatchspeedgoat…Matt gets 3 scrapes!

Check out the notes from the greatest Ultrarunning season ever!

The Year 2006 started off with a bang. With the financial support I needed from Red Bull and talk of breaking 24 hours at the HURT 100, I had to go for it. The record was previously held by Mike Sweeney at 24:50. With little rain the entire week, the course was somewhat benign and proved to be the case running 22:16. Jim Kerby and Bev Abbs put up a fight early but couldn’t levitate as well over the mud finishing 2^nd and 3^rd respectively. Fellow Speedgoat, Scott Mason and I decided to get out of town and head to the American River Track Meet 50 mile in Auburn, CA. It was just that, a boring flat road race, 17^th was all I could muster up running 7:23. From this point on, it was all about the 100 milers. Massannutten came next. I expected the race to be between myself and Matt Estes, the current record holder at 18:12. A Korean named Sim Jae Duk showed up as the mystery man, and he was. Sim and I battled all day up through 75 miles with Matt not far behind. Sim never let up and cranked the record running 17:40. I ran one of my best races running 17:58 also under the record. Matt finished third in another stellar performance at 18:27. Three weeks later a training run at the Squaw Peak 50 proved just that taking second to Allen Bellshaw. My favorite run the Hardrock 100 was run textbook style in 27:07, only 28 minutes off my record of 26:39. With a solid time at Hardrock I had to run Leadville to complete the Rocky Mountain Slam, so I headed to the mining Goliath of a town and finished 8^th with the last 13 miles being a death march due to fried quads. It certainly made me think what was next to come was not possible. I proved myself wrong winning the Wasatch 100 in a a hard fought battle with local Jim Huffman in 20:18 only 35 minutes off my record of 19:43. Next, and to complete the Rocky Mountain Slam was the Bear 100, only 13 days after Wasatch. A snowstorm plowed into the course and changed the route, but in textbook fashion again just cruised to win in 20:35. I planned on ending my season here, but feeling so well in early October I decided to run one more at San Diego and see what could happen. Josh Brimhall and I ran tight early then I slowly pulled away at halfway (7:18) I could not believe the 50 mile split was that fast. I turned back around and hammered home running scared from Josh and smoking my previous record (17:24) running a super-fast 15:48. It was my 5^th 100 mile win of 2006, thus breaking the all-time record for most 100 mile wins in a calendar year. At this point I thought it was over until a vacation with Cheryl’s family in Southern Utah the next week changed plans one more time. The Javelina Jundred was November 4^th, again only two weeks after San Diego. I was in the neighborhood at the end of our RV adventure so I entered at the last minute. I figured I had nothing to lose. The course is somewhat flat so all I had to do was keep running. Joe Kulak mentioned to me if I break his course record of 15:47 he would send me a 6-pack of Philly’s finest Ale. I proved to be quite thirsty and prevailed winning with my fastest 100 ever finishing in 15:25. Six 100 mile wins in a calendar year should be untouchable for a while. I hope to finally win the Ultrarunner of the Year voting, and along with the USATF vote, it would be the first time in quite some time a runner could win both nominations. Baaaaaahhhhhh -Wahsatch Speedgoat