What's the hardest running event?

Dude, lose track of which thread you were replying to?

Miles and Miles,

No worries mate. If you know anything about me from my posts, you know that I don't post for the purpose of provoking - I just give my opinion. We all experience races differently, so it is fine for you to feel the marathon is the toughest. For me I can't go with the marathon because it is so unpredictable and there are too many peaks and valleys for how I've felt anyway during one; you can be feeling horrible for a couple miles but then at mile 21 suddenly get through it and feel great again even if you didn't slow your pace. I can see validity in your argument though.

I suppose there weren't any posted rules about determining which race is the toughest - I just figured it had to all be within the confines of the race.

If we go with recovery time and so on, I'll have to for sure go with the 50 miler I ran. Not only was it very difficult (a whole new level to running JUST a marathon), but that night after the race, if I moved in my sleep, the excruciating pain would wake me up.

As far as pure pain during the race though (even though a 50 miler or even just a marathon is more mentally tough) I'll stick with the 800.