Let's Talk About the HARDEST Race You've Ever Run

Pikes Peak marathon 2019. Off of a base altitude of about 7,000 feet a climb of 7,000 feet up 13 odd miles and back down. Temperatures in the middle of the race hit about 80 degrees and there were only a few water stops due to how hard it is to get things up and down the Barr trail.

Other hard race would be Avenue of the Giants Marathon in 1984. I'd only been running 30 or 40 miles/week. Failed to eat dinner the night before and went out as if I was still in 2:30 shape from the year before. I went from 4th place out of a field of 2,000 or so at the half marathon to barely breaking 4 hours. Probably one of the worst bonks on record - 1:15 at 13.1miles with the 2nd half taking a full 2:30 - meaning that almost the entire field of 2,000 passed me up. But I finished....

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Sham 69 wrote:
In the hardest race I've ever run, I tried staying with the guy on our team who's PR 5k is 15:30. We came through the mile at a BLISTERING 4:45 (it was downhill though).

Then we entered the woods section and I lost contact with the lead pack. They kept accelerating around the tight turns. I was stuck in a second pack with some very skinny guys, which was how I could tell I was still doing pretty good (I'm a muscular football reject).

I just hung on for DEAR LIFE to these skinny guys. My legs were BURNING LIKE A FURNACE! And then we had to run UPHILL. Thankfully, some of my JV teammates were hanging out in there and cheered us on. They were playing "Lose Yourself" by Eminem on speakers. That got me so pumped up that I SPRINTED all the way up the rest of the hill.

I left some people in the DUST but there was still one fool left who was dumb enough to sprint with me. We ran together on the flat part of the course. Some girls were watching so I rolled my uniform up and flexed my abs (they giggled, but it motivated me to go even faster).

The downhill approached and the dumb guy started HAMMERING. I said, "Wait up!" and then he called me fat. Then the guys who I had just blown by on that big hill started catching up to me again. I was in so much pain that I wanted to cry, but I turned that beta energy into alpha energy and stuck with them.

The craziest thing about this race was its antics. We had less than a mile to go and had to run around this pond, and someone was cutting the course short by running right alongside the pond. Another competitor pushed him in for cheating, which I respect. It was really a cool moment. They both got DQed.

With only 800 to go, I tried with ALL MY MIGHT to beat off my competitors. It was so hard because I already did random sprints in my race, and I had almost nothing left. But I wanted to impress the girls. I beat 5/7 who were still remaining in the pack and got my all time PR of 16:47 in the 5k. I celebrated by eating ice cream and buying a race shirt after.

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Anyone else have cool stories like this of your hardest race ever?

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One of the hardest races I've ever run was also one of the slowest/worst times. It was an 800m. I'd missed quite a lot of training through illness - about two months or so if I remember rightly. I was in the process of building fitness back up and was getting there, but there was a league race and they needed people to run.

It's weird that when you're running well, a race that's at a significantly faster pace or even a PB can feel a lot easier than something a lot slower at a different point in your fitness.

I remember warming up and not feeling great. Went through the first lap way too fast, probably similar to how I normally ran it and actually felt OK and like I might manage. The problem came on the second lap when - and I can almost see it right now - we were going around the 1500m start so 300m to go, by the hammer cage. Someone overtook me from behind and I tried to catch her up ahead, I caught her, she dropped behind me. But then she rallied again and pulled past me. I didn't think there was another gear but I pushed it and caught her and overtook. It was that effort that felt almost like a tearing, not physical, I can't describe, it was just beyond my capabilities at the time. It was like searing. I hung on down the back straight, went around the bend, didn't look back, finished the race. The home straight was immensely painful. I don't remember the finish as much as that moment when I kicked it into another gear to catch her by the 300m to go point. After I finished I remember crossing the line but not feeling like I could really hold myself up so I sat on the grass inside the track and then made it quite slowly to the changing room. Everything was swaying and I felt like gravity had multiplied out.

But by that point I really didn't feel well at all. I think I lay on the cold floor in the changing room for about an hour. I didn't feel right. Obviously after some time passed I felt relatively OK again and went home. That race, it's a shame it was in such a race, at a point with less fitness. A bit of a waste really. But that race always sticks out to me as running beyond my abilities at the time.

1500m.. PR was 3:54 at that point.. went out in 1:58 through 800m..finished in 3:53.. last 300m was so laughably painful. I just couldn’t move.

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Sham 69 wrote:
I tried with ALL MY MIGHT to beat off my competitors.

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Half-moon Bay-to-Belmont Marathon. Just south of San Francisco from the coast across a mountain range to Belmont on The bay in the Seventies. Was about 80 degrees or so at start. Mile across fields then long, broken trails and paths uphill for a few miles. Much rocky, broken trail stuff for about an hour. Summit at Pulgas Water Temple, about 20-mis in, where a large crowd of runners and random people and cars were picking up dropouts and milling around in the 95% sun. Down the other side of mountain to a long road stretch, into a neighborhood, where people in yards were spraying hoses at runners. (The shock of cold water almost knocked me out.) Straggled in almost blind to finish in 3:06. Winner was about 2:48.
First time I ever peed black after a race and couldn't recall finishing. A guy said he and a buddy and I ran in together propping each other up.

With no doubt, Spartathlon.
153 miles within 36 hours on roads.
That's now exactly a half lifetime ago when I was still young.

I shed a tear for Sham's story. so Beautiful

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aqi189 wrote:
I shed a tear for Sham's story. so Beautiful

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HS xc 5k state, I went out in about 100th and the course (new course, nobody had run it before) was way hillier than anybody expected so I think I ended up in 100th even though we were all crusin' for a brusin' at the pace we went. It was unseasonably hot and the pace car and the runners were kicking up all this dust, and the oxygen debt slowly but surely built up until I hit the woods with a mile to go (by this point it was so strung out I was in like 100th with absolutely nobody within fifteen seconds of me, way out in no man's land). I honestly have no recollection of going through the woods, but I do remember spitting out like barely moving with 800 to go where the guys behind me rolled me up and I just sat in their pack in agony until the turn with 200 to go, I just closed my eyes and kicked and collapsed over the mat. In the interview with the state champ there's great footage of me rolling around in the background in agony lol

2007 Chicago Marathon. Blistering heat.

los pinos 50K trail race in 100+ degree heat. arguably the most difficult 50K in socal with close to 10,000 ft of elevation gain, and i was dumb enough to take on the challenge.

i barely finished, although i contemplated DNFing on multiple occasions. even then, dropping at an aid station didn't guarantee you sweet respite - it would have taken hours for somebody to pick you up and take you back to the start line. also, the year i ran it the race director decided to give it up because the liability was too high with all the collapsed bodies strewn on the trail.

2013 Tecumseh Trail Marathon. Was originally scheduled for Dec 7, but was cancelled due to a snowstorm that prevented access to the aid station locations. It was rescheduled for Jan 11. There was another snowstorm early in the week and then highs hit 50° the day before the race. Due to flooding on parts of the course it was changed from point-to-point to a 4 mile out, 3 loops and back.
I was supposed to run it with a couple friends, but they were pacing the Louisiana Marathon the following weekend (I had signed up too, before the make-up date was announced). Since I wasn't pacing, rather than forfeit half my registration fee, I decided to run it. I opted not to bother with a hotel and instead woke up at 2am to drive the 4 hours to Bloomington, IN to catch the shuttle bus into the park. A few sections of the road were flooded as veterans of the race directed the bus driver where to go.
It was 37° and overcast that morning. Still plenty of snow on the ground. We found out how tough this race was going to be in the first couple miles as we came up to a good size creek a mile in. Most everyone lined up to walk across some rocks in an effort to keep our feet dry as long as possible. A smarter individual ran straight through the knee high water as few minutes later we were on a trail that was under a foot of water.
The first lap of the 6 mile loop was primarily single track with two mile long sections of ice covered, gravel road (the only time I have ever looked forward to running on ice). Being near the front of the field, the first loop wasn't that bad, considering the conditions. As the few hundred people behind me traversed it though, it would get worse each time. On the third pass I was starting to catch some of the slower runners and trying pass while my feet were sinking up to my ankles in the mud. My only real concern was making it to the finish line without falling, but I would fail at that goal with a mile to go.
When I reached the creek that we crossed at the start of the race I noticed the rocks we jumped across on the way out were now under water. The water level had gone up at least 8" over the past few hours. I tried to walk across them anyways, but would eventually slip off. I luckily landed standing, so while not a full body dunk, I was still up to my waist in ice cold water. It took a minute to get over the shock and start running again.
Finally finished in 4:11 for 21st overall and 11th in the 30-34 age group (seriously, WTF?). I changed near the fireplace in the shelter and got on the shuttle bus to make the 4 hour drive back home. I wouldn't get feeling back in my feet for another 3 days. I would run 3:13 at Louisiana the following weekend.