Ultrarunning's Council of Elders with John Medinger, David Horton, and Scott Mills | Koopcast Episode 153

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the latest edition of the KoopCast. This is Andy Jones-Wilkins sitting in for Jason Koop. All of you listeners are probably relieved to know that this is my last time, my last of four times here sitting in for Coop. Coop will be back later in the month. With apologies to my previous four guests, Casey, Dylan, Jason, and Candice, I have saved the best for last with this one. A few years ago at Hard Rock, at the Hard Rock 100, my good friend Brian Powell, as he does every year, was covering the race for his website, I Run Far, and he snapped a photo of my three guests sitting at a picnic table at the Ure aid station.

I think they were all laughing at the same time. And he simply captioned it, the Council of Elders. And I thought, what a great idea for a podcast. So welcome, everybody, to the Council of Elders. If I spent the next half an hour introducing the three guests I have on today, I probably would still not cover everything that they've done, both in the sport and for the sport. So I had to take some editorial license and narrow it down. But my first guest is David Horton from Virginia. David ran his first Ultra in 1979 at the JFK 50.

And about seven and a half months later, ran his first 100 mile race at the Old Dominion 100. Western States, he ran his first in 1983. And in 1992, became the first winner of the Hard Rock 100, a race that would be close to his heart for years to come after that. A year later, David broke the 30-hour barrier at Hard Rock in 1993. And eight years later, became one of the first of, still to this day, only 15 people in the entire world to finish the Barkley Marathons, all 100 miles. He was a fun run finisher a few years before that.

That was in 2001 when he completed the Barkley. David, later in his career, moved on to tackling long trails, most specifically his beloved Appalachian Trail and his backyard in Virginia, as well as the Pacific Crest Trail, both of which he held speed records on for a number of years. Really, in his post-competitive life, however, is where David has made the most difference in people's lives. He's been a longtime race director. And I'm probably going to forget some of the races. But the Mountain Masochist 50, which is one of the longest standing 50 milers in the country, he was race director for a long time there, as well as a couple of 50Ks, the Holiday Lake 50K, which he no longer directs, and the Promised Land 50K in April, which he still does direct to this day.

And then there's his baby. He still directs it. And I think he's probably the only person who ever can, because it's just really, really annoying. And that's the Hellgate 100K, which is held on the second Friday. It's technically Saturday, because it starts at 12.01 a.m. in December. And the Hellgate 100K has become a staple on many a runner's calendar, especially those beloved Virginia runners that make their way to Camp Bethel every December. And if you have ever had a chance to go there and you hear David with his pre-race briefing, you can hear the passion and the commitment in his voice. Finally, David served as a professor at Liberty University for going on four decades.

And there has inspired a generation going on two generations to hit the trails as part of his running class. So, David Horton, welcome to the Council of Elders. Thank you. Thank you. I'm honored to be with these young gentlemen. Thanks, David. Next up, we have Scott Mills. By the way, I'm introducing the guests in order of their first ultra. Scott ran his first ultra in 1981 and ran his first Western States in 1982. Scott Mills is the only person in the world who has finished the Western States 100 20 times and the Hard Rock 100 10 times.

I was fortunate enough to be at the finish line for several of those finishes, some of which were beautiful, some of which were a little bit ugly, but all of which were dramatic and done in classic Scotty Mills style. His first Hard Rock was in 1996. And his most recent finish there, which was in 2021, marked his 10th finish. And he wasn't done yet because just this past July, he finished the Cascade Crest 100 up in the Northwest in about 33 hours and change. Scotty also is, as the other two guests we have on the podcast today, incredibly active in the ultra running community.

And having over the years split time due to jobs and other commitments, split time between two ultra hotbeds, San Diego, where he lives now, and Virginia. He's made his presence felt in both as a very active member of the Virginia Happy Trails Running Club, arguably the best running club in the world. Scotty jumped right in when he moved out there the first go round and was an active participant in a lot of their events, both as a volunteer, as a competitor, as an organizer, as somebody who mentors runners and got them out on the trails. And likewise, it has been a bulwark in the San Diego ultra running community, directing most notably the San Diego 100 miler up until a couple of years ago, which if you've been following the sport for any period of time, has enjoyed a wonderful couple of decades of success in a very classy, kind of low key, humble way, which very much is the way Scotty is.

So Scotty, welcome to the podcast. And our final guest is John Medinger. He ran his first ultra a year later than Scotty in 1982. Ran a lot in the Bay Area, which is where I first met him when he lived up in the Oakland Hills. He ran his first Vermont, his first 100 in the Vermont 100 in 1989. An excellent 100 mile race, by the way. And I know I remember crossing paths with Tropical John, as we call him many times at the Vermont 100, where he would travel across the country to be a spectator there quite often. He ran his first Western States in 1997. A notable year, which was the first year a non-West coaster won the race.

I'm sure Mr. Horton remembers this as Mike Morton won the race, went under 16 hours. And Mike Morton was a Virginia runner. And I think from time to time probably got out there with with Dr. Horton and Courtney Campbell and some of those other Vermont crazies. A claim to fame for John Medinger, Chris Scott, who I think is known to everybody on this call as well, for a number of years, did a couple of events. First, the Coyote 4 play and then the Coyote 2 moon. And in 2008, John Medinger won the Coyote 2 moon outright, the 100K. There was something about the rules and bonus time and boner minutes. But nonetheless, ultra sign up gives them 100 percent for the 2008 Coyote 2 moon at the ripe old age of 57.

Outside of competition, John, this would be an incredibly long list if I mentioned everything, but 30 years as a Western States 100 board member, currently board member emeritus, was had two terms as the president of the board and along with his better half. Lisa continues to serve as the finish line announcer every year at Placer High School, took a turn as the owner and publisher of Ultra Running Magazine. Still, by the way, to this day, coordinates the Ultra Runner of the Year voting, tabulating all the results from across the sport of every North American runner and helps organize that voting, which is really like herding cats, I can assure you, and has been an extremely successful race director at the Quad Dipsy, one of my favorites, Miwok, and Lake Sonoma, which he basically invented.

And long before Javelina was a thing, Lake Sonoma was the party race of the year each April, and John and Lisa did a remarkable job on that. And speaking of party, I'm going to close with this. When John and Lisa lived in the Bay Area, high in the Oakland Hills, every October, they hosted a party called the 101st Mile Party, where all of the folks in the area who had finished a 100-mile race that year came and enjoyed a little group run and some fellowship. And it was a remarkable place. Among other things, it was where I was able to meet such ultra luminaries luminaries as Anne Trayson and Dean Karnazes, who are just walking around Tropical John's house like it's theirs. So, John, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks for being here. Thanks, AJW. I'm really pleased to be here with all three of you guys. All right. All right. Well, David, I'm going to start with you. Thank you. This time of year, you are gearing up for your big event, Hellgate. And I know one of the things that you're passionate about is maintaining the trails. I know you have to maintain the trails. How, as a race director for so many years, I'm specifically thinking about trail maintenance and how much time you put into it and how important it is as you work with other agencies and so forth, and how much it's changed from when you first started Mountain Masochist all those years ago to up to the moment as you're, you know, felling trees on the Hellgate course a little bit more than a month before the race.

How much has that aspect of your work as a race director changed over the years? Depends on the year. Depends on the weather. But in a typical year, I spend tons of time working on the trails. I love it. I really, really love it. I maintain a section of the Appalachian Trail a little over three miles, and I maintain that for 30 years. And so I love working on the Appalachian Trail. I love working on the courses that we use for the Hellgate, as well as Promise Land, as well as Maschist. I helped some last week at Maschist. I've already spent 13 trips to cut trees on the Hellgate course, and I'll probably spend another two or three days out on the Hellgate course doing the work.

And I just love it. I enjoy it. And I love being out there, and I try to do as much as I can. And I can't do quite as much as I used to. Can't work as hard. It's not as tough, but I still love it. I've got five steel chainsaws. I've got two industrial wheat eaters. We've got two industrial blowers. All steel products. And just really love the trails. Love working the trails. And we've had bad weather a number of years, ice storms, hairline winds where you just knock trees down. But I enjoy that part. And it's fun. And I think most people who go with me, we have a good time working on the course. How is it? A lot of folks our age are kind of knocking on the younger generation for me kind of not doing your part.

How do you rally the troops to get work parties out there, six, eight, ten people to get the work done? Do you just strong arm them? Or do you reach into your Liberty alumni? Or how do you get folks out there? Or do you just have like a core group that comes out year after year? A little bit of all of that. I have older people and I have younger people. I have students as well. I don't like students as well as older people because older people know what to do. And they've been there before. And it's sort of like the aid stations. I have some of the same aid station crews year after year. And I try to take care of them. And I've always thought about the statement someone told me a long time ago, take care of the people who take care of you. So I try to take care of the trail workers and make it fun and enjoyable.

And we really do have a good time. But I like older people. And I like people who have done the race, too, and who are running the race. Don't like the young people. I don't like the young people. You seem to have a particular soft spot in your heart for the ham radio guys. Yeah. They're great. They donate their time every year. I have one guy who has worked every single year since I met him in 1983 for the first Mount Mascus. And he's worked, I think, every race we've had since. And there's several others that worked every race since. We try to take care of them as well. And it'd be tough without them. They really keep control and keep good count, too, as well. So, yeah, those are good people. Those are great people.

Awesome. Hey, Scotty, you on the other side of the country in San Diego, the San Diego 100, you in many ways, you grew it to what it is. I know in the last couple of years, you've stepped away from race directing. But I know from reliable sources that you still show up every year. What's the, as a race in an area that does have quite a bit of trail network and quite a bit of active involvement in the trails, what's the dynamic out there as you're trying to rally folks to do trail work to get organized for the race? Similar to David? I think what David articulated is very, very characteristic of what we face in the San Diego East County Mountains. We have a program which is under the tutelage of the San Diego Ultra Running Friends Running Group, which is akin to the Virginia Happy Trails Running Club that funds and sponsors our trail work days.

We call it Trail Fit. And basically, we encourage people to get out there, not just those who are trying to get qualification for 100 mile certification to enter the races, but we motivate them to come out and help maintain work and clear the trails that they love, not only for the numerous races that we have in San Diego, but also for just going out on training runs. We also have a program that we kind of keep track of all the hours that volunteers put in doing trail maintenance. And during our annual holiday party, we give tickets for raffles and free entries into donated races. So we've got some motivation there. But I think as David said, what we're trying to do is instill the pride and the passion and the volunteerism to give back to the community.

And we've been very successful in the San Diego area. Yeah. And how does, you know, given the fact that you had those years in Virginia as well, and I mentioned in the intro, Virginia Happy Trails Running Club, and I'm sure you have fond memories of that. I mean, we're a big country, right? We've got you, you lived 3,000 miles away from San Diego when you lived in Virginia and vice versa. I've lived in both places, both coasts as well. The vibe is still the same. I think that we have more in common, the Beast Coast versus the West Coast than we think we do. Don't you? Oh, absolutely. I think we have much more in common. But I will tell you a little funny anecdote, which I always loved. For those who are familiar with the Massanutton Mountain Trails 100, which the Virginia Happy Trails Club originated, geez, I think it was over 20 years ago now.

One, they do their trail days and everything. But, you know, Massanutton is known for its incredible number of rocks and technicality of the course. And I remember one year going out to do trail maintenance there, and there were horse people out there that were also helping maintain the trail in conjunction with ours. And they were removing rocks from the trail when we came along. And I'll remember Anster Davidson, who was the president of BHTRC at this time, saying to the horse people, what are you doing removing the rocks? We're just going to have to come behind you and throw them back on the trail. That's good. I can hear that coming right out of Anster's mouth. John. Anyway, to get back to your original question, yeah, I think there's a lot of similarities.

Yeah. Yeah. Tropical John, you race directed in some of the most sort of notoriously sort of regulation heavy places in the country, the Bay Area, the trails in the Marin Headlands and the Dipsy Trail and even maybe a little bit less so out at Lake Sonoma. How did you manage the old sort of trail maintenance, trail work? I know you had to do a couple of sort of course changes over the years and weather comes in at something like Quad or Miwok. How did your experience with volunteers and getting the trails in shape for your events go in those years you race directed? So, John, you're in one of the places that is sort of most notoriously regulation heavy in terms of trails and multi-use and very congested use and all kinds of different users in the Marin Headlands and on the Dipsy Trail.

Tell us a little bit about your management of trail work and keeping the trails going as you prepared for some of those events, which are certainly big events. Yeah, in Marin for the Quad, Dipsy and Miwok, those trails are pretty well maintained by the local powers that be. We've had some minor stuff to clean up from time to time, which we've done kind of surreptitiously. I'm not going to try to get him arrested, but his name rhymes with John Katz. That's has been really useful on the Dipsy Trail and getting out there at odd hours with the chainsaw to take down trees out and stuff.

In Sonoma, it was completely different. Lake Sonoma is run by the Army Corps of Engineers. We had a couple of major incidents over the years. A few years ago, there was a big mudslide about three weeks before the race. And when I talked to the Rangers, it's like, well, it's too big for us to handle. We'll get it done, but we have to hire somebody. And that's a process and it'll never happen by race day. So I just kind of put out the word help. And a couple of pros, Chaz Shea and Elka Reamer, came for the weekend from the Auburn area and helped us build. We built a little work around the slide area, which nobody liked at all because it was really steep and loose.

But it was better than not being able to go through. And then a couple of years ago, one of the many fires in Sonoma County touched the south side of Lake Sonoma in a couple of places. And the local crew, by then we had recruited more local people to come help out. And Todd Bertoloni and Tracy Poole and Skip Brand and some other people got in with their chainsaws and took out well over 100 trees that had fallen over the winter so that the race could happen as per normal. And there was a couple of places where it was a little bit like where Wasatch comes into Bear Creek above Telluride and they had that big avalanche a few years ago.

You went through an area and it looked like a whole forestry project had gone on there. But trail maintenance, you know, it varies from place to place. At Western states because of the winters in the high country, there's always a lot of stuff to do. Fortunately, California winters are usually fairly benign. And so the amount of year to year maintenance is probably lower than a lot of places in the country. I wanted to start with this topic. I know it seems somewhat mundane talking to, you know, this esteemed group of panelists. But I think, you know, I want I think it's important for all ultra trail runners to realize that the trail doesn't just magically appear on race day.

That hours and days and energy and organization goes into preparing a race venue for a race. And, you know, all three of you have race directed races with logistical complications, with transportation challenges, with permitting challenges and the like, all of which we could spend time talking about. We're not going to. But with with respect to the trail, I mean, without the trail, you know, we we don't have anything. And I I remember that reroute at Lake Sonoma. Or I remember one year, David, at at masochist where a gate there was a nobody had the key to the gate. And so the aid station couldn't come down. And, you know, you just had to kind of make a make up the rules as you go along.

And I and I think sometimes in this in this era we're in right now, where there's a like a strong desire on the part of the public to kind of have everything taken care of for them. We need to realize that, you know, we're staging events out there, you know, way off the beaten track and that the challenges of preparing for those are are significant. So shifting, shifting gears to the racing and the race experience, David, starting with you, when you think back over your ultra career and you think back to those early years, JFK in 1979, Western States in 1983 and so forth, even your first ever hard rock in 1982. I mean, when we when we look at people heading out on races today, it's like they're going out for a, you know, for a four day expedition.

If you were to look back on those days and give advice based on the past, and I don't want this to be like a, you know, a grumpy old guy saying this is the way it was back in the day, but it was a simpler time back then. Take, for example, your first hard rock in 1992. Do you remember, you know, what you left Silverton with? I have no idea. Do you remember what they had at the aid stations? Not much. Like a lot of races, there's very, very little. JFK was unreal how little it had. Basically, it's had water and maybe a little food, but not much food. Hot food. Forget it. Aid stations are much, much better now than they were then.

And how about shoes? Did you you probably wore road shoes, right? No, no. Use Montrail, Vitesse and Leona Divides, which were really good shoes. And I think some of the shoes back then were better than now, mainly with a toe guard because the toe guard used to be really, really reinforced in the Montrail shoes. So, yeah, things are better. There's a lot of better things now. A lot better food and stuff now. And the aid stations are a lot better. And people expect that. By the way, I have it on good authority that our mutual friend Gary Nippling still wears Montrail Vitesse. That's hard to do. But I agree. That was a fantastic shoe. And so if there was one piece of gear that you had back then that you wish runners would still use now, that's probably not the case.

But what do you see in runners right now that you're like, why the heck are you carrying that? Overall, I think they're better prepared in a way because they have so many things. And they know the mileages. They know the distance they're going. And, of course, they sort of say that some of my mileages are off, which they are. But they know how far they're running. They know what the distance is. Let me just interject here, Andy, that for the listeners unfamiliar with the concept, there is a thing called a Horton Mile, which is somewhere usually around a mile and a half, maybe two miles. And so, you know, when they tell you it's six miles to the next aid station and two and a half hours later, you're still wondering where it is while you've run into Horton Miles.

Yes. For sure. No race director has suffered the indignation of the ultra running community as a result of the introduction of GPS devices more than David Horton. That's great stuff. And, indeed, I can only imagine what running JFK in 1979 was like. Scotty, it was just a couple of years later that you ran probably one of the first organized, you know, regularly or not like the Gordy era organized Western states in 1982. You know, we had many of the same aid stations and some of the iconic spots. But bring the listeners back. Do you remember that day in 1982? And, of course, the running, but also the, you know, what did you eat?

What did you drink? What did you carry? You know, what was the deal with Western states back in 1982? I think there's a lot of things that have remained over the years. But I do recall very vividly my first Western states. I was staying in Truckee and got in the car and went to the start line. And I had, back then they didn't have the Aqua backpacks, but we had waist belts with water bottles. But they didn't even have water bottles back then. So a lot of people will recall using the old maple syrup Aunt Jemima with a handle on it. And that was a water bottle, you know, because you had a handle on it. But my goodness, we did carry, I've carried some power bars.

They didn't have gels or anything like that. The aid stations, as David suggested, were much minimal, much less stuff. But we also have to remember something. We ran a lot slower then. Just, I mean, you look at the records and the times and the evolution of the sport. And a lot of these athletes, the training has been a big part of it. But I also think equipment and access to more food and other equipment has really facilitated the times continually coming down over the last 30 years, for sure. I definitely ran with more stuff than maybe I would today because you can rely on the aid stations.

However, these other variables of equipment and everything and the access to much more quantified aid stations has made a huge difference in the times. And my times, even over the years, my times have gotten better due to that, not necessarily because I've trained harder. How did you know, though? Like in 1982, it was a year after you'd run your first Ultra. Like what sort of, were you flying blind? Did you talk to some other, I mean, there weren't even that many old timers back then. Because you only had, I mean, the only old timer around was Gordy. You know, where did you go for guidance on how to run this thing? Or was it just kind of, I'm just going to get out there and see what happens? That's an excellent question. And I was very, very fortunate because I met a person up in Michigan Bluff when I went up for one of my training runs called Tom Zavartank.

And in the old days, most people have never heard of Tom. He had completed like the first three or four Western states. And he was hanging out at Michigan Bluff with his son, Davey, training. And I introduced myself and said, I'm running my first Western states. And he shared every ounce of knowledge that he had and experience with me on that first day that I met him. And then I continued to go up every weekend and meet him. And it was invaluable, you know. And I think Tom Zavartank ended up doing Western states seven times. But if it hadn't been for him, I think I would have been flying a lot in the blind, you know. We did still have the early issues of Ultra Running Magazine. And there are a few articles in there about long distance, 100 or 50 milers.

And I was an avid reader and took a lot of information from that. But I would credit Tom Zavartank with a huge part of my early success. That's fantastic. Shout out to Tom. Tropical John, did you know Tom? I did. He was actually a member of the same running club, the Pommikids in San Francisco as me. He's a really interesting guy because he studies insects. He's like a professor at San Francisco State. And he knows more about mosquitoes than you'd ever care. You'd ever care. There's all different kinds of mosquitoes. And he studied the death out of them. He could talk about bugs for hours on end.

Well, and John, you came of ultra age in the Bay Area, arguably the hotbed of Ultra Running even now. But certainly it was then. Was it similar? Did you just have to sort of find your people and get your little tidbits of advice? I mean, you did that out and back double marathon a number of years. You did AR a bunch of times. Like in those years, was it similar? Did you just sort of try and find the information where you could? I was pretty lucky because when I started thinking about running more than a marathon, I was already friends with Dick Collins and Ruth Anderson, who were both real pioneers.

They both ran Western in the 70s. And there wasn't a lot of knowledge and there was almost no equipment. Right. We wore cotton shirts because there wasn't anything else. The headlamp hadn't been invented yet. So we carried like a double D cell mag light through the night because it would last for 12 hours. And coincidentally, if a mountain lion attacked you, you could beat it upside the head with the thing. And I remember a couple of things. The first water bottle I ever saw was made by Specialized. It was a bicycle company in Oakland. And it was the same size 20 ounce bottle as people are familiar with now.

But it had a flip top cap that always broke off and it didn't have a handle. So you'd have to fashion a handle out of duct tape or something in order to not have to grip the thing the entire time. Power bar hadn't been invented yet. We use payday bars because they didn't fall apart in your pack. So, John, you actually had an actual like ultra water bottle instead of Scotty's, you know, Aunt Jemima. Well, it was the same shape more or less as the bottles we're using today. It just didn't have a hand strap or anything. So you had to fashion one.

And one of my buddies was a big scuba diver and commercial scuba diver. He cleaned the hulls on ships and stuff. And so he started fashioning a strap out of neoprene. And that worked pretty well. And then Carol Hewitt, you know, had who has the aid station at Michigan Bluff in the front yard. She started making little like beer cozy things that would go around the water bottle and insulate it a little bit from your hand. You can edit this out if you need to, but she called them Hewitt hand jobs.

Oh, that's fantastic. Well, I mean, on the mentoring thing, I have to say, you know, so I came of age in the sport in the mid 90s. Arguably, you know, when I moved out here mostly to moved out here to Arizona and discovered the trails and ran with people like, you know, Scott Mojolewski and met people like Jerry Kolgarif. And you guys remember back then there was the ultra list, the ultra list serve. I think a bunch of bunch of people on this are like, what? What's the ultra list serve? But I think that's what we had to depend on. And, you know, Scotty, I ran AC and got to know all.

I mean, my main mentor at the time, you probably know this was Tom, Tommy Nielsen out there. And in San Diego, just a guy who he maybe was one of the few people on the trail that talked more than me. Probably not as much as Horton. But, you know, I think we got to get into a little bit of a little bit of individual history. And, David, I'm going to I'm going to start with you because you're you're the only Barkley finisher on this on this call right now. And you finished it in 2001. That's 21 years ago. And we know that Barkley as a Barkley and Laz has kind of become a phenomenon, you know, in large part because of social media and videos and and what we've seen over the years.

But, I mean, when you finished in 2001, how many times had you been there before that? I think I'd been there six or seven times before that. But several of those times I didn't go there with the objective of trying to do the hundred. The hundred used to be impossible because and why I say that is it used to be a little bit different. Nineteen, nineteen and seventeen. And that adds up to fifty five miles. I said, well, Gary, what do you do for the hundred? He said, well, you do that again. I said, well, fifty five and fifty five. That's one hundred and ten. He said, yeah, about a hundred miles. And at the time, it was the time limit was 50 hours.

And then in nineteen ninety five, he changed it up to where is a twenty mile loop and you had to do five loops. And then he increased the time limit to 60 hours. And I thought that's possible. And that was nineteen ninety five. Well, I didn't enter that year because I was doing the Transamerica race. And I thought that's possible. And the guy, Mark, what's his name? Mark something from England finished it. Hartel? No, it's somebody else. Marshall. No, it's Mark. No. Mark. Mark somebody. OK. Yeah. But anyway, that's when it became possible, I thought. And sure enough, thereafter, a few people finished every once in a while. It is it is unreal hard.

It's insanely hard. Well, I remember talking to a couple of the people that you've mentored, specifically Andrew Thompson and Jonathan Basham, who are both finishers. Barkley Marathon's finishers. And a lot of it was Mark Williams. Mark Williams. Thank you, John. A lot of the a lot of the wisdom of that race was kind of passed down through. I remember talking to John JB. He would go. He went seven, eight years just to kind of take the scene in and and get to know it. It was very much like an acquired thing, wasn't it? Yeah, to a certain extent, because you had to sort of learn the lay of the land, even though he was making changes every year. The land doesn't change.

Your approach to different areas did change. But you did learn and no one's really done well the first time there. I mean, look at Courtney and Maggie, who are extremely good runners, and they're barely finishing two laps, much less trying to get close to five. And five is insanely beyond that. Just to give you an idea how hard it is. One year I finished the fun run at Barkley, and that was my objective. Just do the fun run. I did 30 hours and 23 minutes. And then I did hard rock that same year and did 30 hours and 27 minutes. So 100 miles, 60 miles at Barkley was about the same as 100 miles at hard rock.

Well, and isn't it also your fault, as well as our mutual good friend Blake Wood's fault, that now that if you finish four, you have to go opposite directions? Because one year you guys kind of... Tell that story. That's our fault. That's our fault. Well, Blake had come pretty close to finishing. No American had finished it. And it bugged me that Williams had finished it. And I thought, I'm as good as he is. I can run with him. If he can finish that, I can finish that. And there was a picture of him sitting in front of a rock wall. I thought, I want my picture in front of that rock wall. Well, when we got there one year, I told Blake, I said, Blake, you got close to finishing it and I got close to finishing. Let's finish this thing. So basically we ran together the whole way.

And does it help? The answer is yes. Right. Which is then, of course, just led Laz to changing the rules. Yes. So that's your fault. Yes. Yes, it is. Scotty, jumping down to you. Hardest race you ever did and why? To be honest with you, it was last July, the Cascade Crest 100. And it was just because of age. You know, I'm 70 years old and I dug deeper and suffered more than I ever have. A combination of age, maybe three weeks off of getting COVID, very tough conditions. And I'll never forget that because it took me, I got in with only 18 minutes to spare and I don't think I left anything out there.

It pales in comparison to what David talked about with Barclay and some of his experiences at Hard Rock and everything. I can't even get my arms around those type of events. In fact, David knows that I'm not capable of that because several times when we were training at Hard Rock, he would yell out to me, I don't think Scotty should come up here. That is the classic line. Scotty shouldn't come up here. But yeah, in my memory, the last year's 100 miler was without a doubt, or this last summer is the hardest. Followed closely by this last weekend in Mexico. No, no, no recency bias at all. It's just like, man, this is, this is hard stuff. The older we get.

Yeah, that old saw that the hardest ultra is, is the one you're doing at the moment. I will make a statement about Hard Rock. That first year we had covered in terms of me and Trujillo and, and Dennis Herr had covered the whole course in terms of finding the course. It was on a map, but we had to find the course. We found the course and then marked the course that first year. And we had done that over the period of about a week and a half. And then I thought, we've got to do this all in one day. No way can it be done in one day, but we're here. We've got to do it. We've got to try. We didn't know if it was even possible to do it. And there was a doctor in town that said, someone's going to get killed at that race.

That is dangerous. And of course, they thought the same thing at Leadville as well. The first year that they ran that, they thought someone's going to die doing this. So there's so many things that people thought was impossible. But now they found out it is possible. And that's why Barkley is possible. Although the last five years, no one's finished. So I, you know, I asked Scotty about the 1982 Western States. It was 10 years later you did the hard rock. And I mean, it was, I assume gear was kind of pretty minimal, aid stations pretty minimal, maybe a little bit more upscale medical support. Did you, was there a fair amount of root finding back then? I mean, the course was marked, but I would assume minimally, right? Well, they had problems. They had problems with the elk eating the streamers and then finding out that the reflective streamers didn't, they worked in the nighttime, but they didn't work very well in the daytime.

You had to put the reflective streamers up, plus put a yellow streamer down from it so it would work. And of course, what we've found is there's, we have reflective streamers that are permanent. We can use them year after year for our races that the miners developed up in West Virginia. And they are just fantastic. But yeah, it was, it was a little bit of root finding. You sort of had to know where to go because there just wasn't marked quite as well. And even now, I'm not sure how well they market, but people do get lost. David, I would interject and you'll remember this well. Part of the way we could follow the course is you, myself, Joe Clapper, and a few others. We went out there two or three weeks before the event and covered the whole course.

Yes. And just covering it, knowing it knowledge-wise, even if we lost some of the markers, we kind of knew where we were going. Yep. Yep. Yep. That helps. So, so, so John, I got to, I got to switch over to you and your crowning moment with your first place at the 2008 Coyote 2 Moon 100K. Because it's, I mean, it's true. Explain that please to the listeners. Inquiring minds want to know. All I can say for sure is it's clear I have something on Chris Scott. And that will go unsaid. That's good. And we'll leave it at that. I think for everybody, everybody on this podcast, we all know Chris Scott. If you don't know Chris Scott, maybe you're fortunate.

But yeah, that's good stuff. So, so I want to, I want to shift. One of the, you know, we, between the three of you, you have, I mean, 150, going on 150 cumulative years experience in, in ultra running. It's clear that we're experiencing right now and have been since about 2010, 11. John, you know, this from all your statistics keeping with ultra running magazine and, and ultra running the year and all that. We, we know that we're experiencing this, this boom and this growth and people coming into the sport, you know, on a, on a, on a regular basis and in many ways on a massive basis. And, and we're seeing changes happen, some of which are sticking and some of which seem to come and go.

But as you think, both as, as long time competitors, long time, you know, organizers, and certainly people who value and, and want, you know, to see the sport continue. What do you see right now as the biggest challenge to the future of ultra running? John, we'll start with you. Well, that's a good question. You know, growth is always tricky and the sport has exploded in terms of the numbers of runners in the U S it's gone up by a factor of almost 10 in the last 20 years.

And in Europe, there are more ultra runners in Europe than there are in North America by about 50%. And going back 20 years ago, there were almost none. So you can see what's, I mean, UTMB obviously was a big driver in that, but there's, as you guys know, any number of very large events over there. And now Asia, you know, is, has, but for the, but for the, you know, the pandemic was on a similar growth curve prior to the pandemic that Europe was on. So we're seeing it become way more mainstream than it ever was in the past.

Um, I was listening to some TV newscast a few months ago and they, instead of saying, you know, it was a marathon contest, they said it was an ultra marathon contest. And, uh, and they talked about ultra marathons in an article in the New York times a little while ago without bothering to explain to the reader what an ultra marathon was. It was assumed the reader knew what an ultra marathon was. Um, that, um, it is a lot to manage. Um, the sport in terms of organization is changing dramatically. Um, most events outside the U S are now for profit events.

Um, whereas the tradition in the U S had always been, you know, as more voluntary nonprofit orientation. Um, and even in the U S now, more and more of the events are being organized by professional race management outfits. Some of them are small outfits like, you know, Candace Bergdorf or, or Julie Fingar. But then you have Aravaipa, uh, you know, it has a whole bunch of people working there and they put on a, any number of fantastic events. But again, it's just a different ethos than it was 20, 30, 40 years ago. Um, and so there's some good things. There's lots more events. They're way better organized than they were in the past.

There's lots more stuff at the aid station. The courses are well marked. The information is available, but due to the popularity, any number of the best events have lotteries. You can't be spontaneous anymore. Um, you have to sign up six months or a year in advance to do the races you want to do. And even for the race organizer, I mean, the good thing for a race organizer is, you know, your race is going to be full. So in terms of how much stuff to buy, you know, exactly how much you need and that sort of thing. You're not guessing. Um, but the good old days have just kind of decided to do something on a lark or kind of mostly minus. I remember the first time I went to Hard Rock, uh, and Scotty, I'll remember this was, I think 1997 when our friend John Demarest did it for the first time.

And, uh, we got into town a couple of days before the race and I was walking, uh, down Green Street in Silverton and, and I ran into Dale Garland, who's been the race director since the beginning. And I knew him a little bit from other races and, Hey, what are you doing here? I said, Oh, I came to pace and crew for a friend. And he's like, Oh, you know, and he asked who he was and stuff. And he's like, he looks at me and he's like, you know, there's still 20 spots left if you want to run. So imagine that happening today. Wow. Wow. I think, I think there are probably thousands of listeners hearing that right now. Like, wait, what, what?

I have, I have half a percent chance of getting picked this year. You know, Scotty, you've seen it. You've, you know, you've had an interesting, because of your, you know, you've participated in these big event, you know, events that used to be small and are now big. Take, take you from your first Western States to your 20th and from your first hard rock to your most recent hard rock. You've, you've literally seen that you've lived those changes, at least in those two big races. And also you just, you just traveled down to, to Mexico for, you know, for a 50 K that was part of a much larger kind of UTMB Ironman type event. What are, what are you seeing, you know, as, you know, as you're one of the folks on, you know, you're maybe the only one on this call who's still like actively participating in ultras.

What are you seeing both as a participant and as somebody who's been around long enough, been a race director, been someone who cares about the sport and, and has seen kind of the other side, like the VHTRC club side, homegrown grassroots. Where do you, where do you see that sort of reconciliation happening or not? Well, first of all, you know, I think Tropical John articulated it expertly, the transition from a personal standpoint, looking from the early years to now. So some of the changes that are somewhat not upsetting, but disappointing is the numbers in fact, take away from the experience, in my opinion, because, you know, my experience in the early years, as you'd go out, whether it be Western States or Hard Rock, and you could run with a group, small number of people, you get to know them.

And, and there was a lot of socializing going on. And because the sport was so much smaller, it was almost like a reunion at some of the early races, you'd see the same people year in and year out. And it was, it was really nice to get to know people and have a community type feeling about the event. Fast forward today, and you have, for example, for this 50K that I did last week, a thousand people starting, granted from all over the world, but it's so crowded, and it's so congested. And there's so many people that you don't know, that you somewhat feel like you're an island. You know, you're, you're, you're running, not with the same feeling of, of, of enjoying the trail and the event, you're working hard and everything, but you don't have the camaraderie, I guess, that I did in the early years.

Having said that, as the race thins out, I always make an effort. If I'm running around somebody that's about my pace to introduce myself and get to know them and, and, and run together with them. The difference now is you may have to wait 20 or 30 miles for the field to spread out, to be able to, as opposed to right from the beginning, when you start walking up Squaw Valley and you can start making conversation and, and share experiences right from the beginning. But TJ said it well, you know, the, the explosive nature of the level of participation has some drawbacks. You know, it's also very sad to me that I've had the ability to experience so many great events because I was able to get in them.

And, but we all know people now that have been trying to get into Western States or hard rock for five, 10 or more years. And just because of the lottery and the numbers, many of them will never have the experience to be able to run those events. And that's, that's a little disheartened. Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I'm, I'm, David, I'm going to get to you in a second because I, I think I have a, I think I have a thought that would take what Scotty said and, and advance it. But I also feel as though, you know, I was fortunate enough not to run Western States 20 times, but to run it 10 times. And, and, and, and all of those times, I felt like each, each progressive opportunity, each progressive run built my sense of community at the race. So that now eight and a half years later, when I go back now every year to volunteer, it's in that, it's in that volunteer core, um, that I feel that camaraderie.

Right. And it's, it's, it's not, it's not as, it's not as in the crucible as feeling that camaraderie in the actual race. But, you know, for the, for example, the, the two hours that I spend up in the booth with Lisa, John's better half, you know, Lisa and I could go an entire year and not talk at all. We, we do, but, and we, though we cherish those two hours and we know whatever's going on in the rest of our lives, you know, from 5am to 7am on the fourth Sunday in June, we're going to be hanging out in the Placer high school, uh, announcers booth. And so I do think there are ways that certain events, I mean, Western States does a wonderful job in establishing a community within their aid stations with running clubs and, and so forth.

I think hard rock does the same, but there is a certain, you, you, one can't help, but have a certain nostalgia for the good old days and, and hope that the people coming, because a lot of the people coming to the sport, they come to the sport because they want that. They want what they might not have had in road racing or what they didn't have if they were a cyclist or a triathlete. And pivoting to you, David, you've intentionally, I think I've only run Hellgate once, but I've been around the race a bunch more times. You've almost intentionally created an event that's like that, where people are welcomed to come back year after year, where there's a, there's almost forced camaraderie because among other things, they have to organize car pools to the start.

They have to figure out how they're going to get their crews from one place to another. And I, and I know it's your, it's your baby. You even still have people apply to the race. You can't just sign up for the race. You want to make sure it's 66.6 miles in the middle of winter in Virginia, most of which is at night. Is that a little bit of the method to your madness in that event? Or am I completely off base? You're correct. The board is very small. Me and you can maybe guess, maybe no one else. So I make all the decisions. Decisions fall on me. If it works out good, it's good. But I want to keep it small. I want to keep it fun. I want to keep it neat. And I've never had to turn away more than 15 or 20 people until this year.

This year I had, what was it? 210 or 20 entries and only allow 150 in the race. So I had to tear up checks as well as applications for over 70 people. On what basis? Hmm. I don't want to have to explain it to anyone because then they might pin me down to that. But that's not enjoyable. I don't like to turn away that many people. I'd like for everyone to experience it. But you've got to keep the experience the same. 150. We could have more. The course could have more. But it would make it a big race and not a small family race. And I like that small knit group. And it's really special. But man, I'm having to tell more and more people no.

And I don't like that. It's not fun. That part is not nice. I will say, Andy, that we've talked a lot about hard rock and Western states and the big races in the U.S. One of the great things about the U.S. is that there are still a lot of low-key local races. And so for those of us who like empty trail in front of us, part of the race, who like to be able to schmooze with the people around us without it having, you know, being hundreds of people, you know, go run your local races. There may not be very many, you know, there's 150, 100-mile races in the U.S. And a lot of them are really small with, you know, 20 or 30 or 40 runners.

And I don't know. I can't speak to how well organized they all are. But they do have the same sort of old-school vibe around them, which is great. When you go to other parts of the world, if you want to run an ultra in France, you better like other people because they're all pretty good size or virtually all. But, you know, and it's not all about the races, too. I mean, all three of you guys have long been, you know, pied pipers for the group run. You know, John, I remember the Tuesday night Woodminster runs in the Bay Area. Or Scotty, I know you're, you know, getting people out every Saturday into the hills in San Diego. And Lord knows, David, you've, you know, trained a generation or two on, you know, just getting together.

It's not all about the races. We can enjoy the sport. We can enjoy outdoors. We can enjoy the trails without a race also. And so those of us who are hungering or hungry for that sense of community, that sense of belonging, that sense of camaraderie, it's out there. And for those of us who've been around the sport a long time, in many ways, it's what got us here and is what's kept us here. Right? I mean, between the four of us, we could easily be doing something else. Right? We could easily be just enjoying playing golf or, you know, hanging out or going on cruises, you know, but we're here. And I think a huge part of it is the community.

So I want to close, and I would like each of you to want to close with, you know, it's November. We're recording this on November 2nd. Let's look ahead to the year, and let's just hear what you're up to. David, you know you've got Hellgate in five weeks, so I imagine that's a lot of what's on your calendar over the next five weeks. But what's ahead for you in 2023, you know, personally, professionally? You got any big bike rides planned? Tell the listeners what you're up to over the next year. I'm not sure what I'm going to do next year, and I hate that because I still compete in the bike races. I'm not that good at it. But this summer, I did a 1,500-mile bike race from Portland, Oregon to San Diego, California. And I may do a shorter one next year from Sacramento to San Diego, which is 750 miles.

So I may do that one next year. Or I may do the Tour Divide from BAMP Canada to Antelope Wells, New Mexico. I still have to get my fix. I'm still like everyone else. I have to get my fix, even though I'm slow and old. I'm older than all you guys. I'm 72 now. But I still got to do something. And I'm still planning on directing Promised Land April 22, 2023. And I still plan on directing Hellgate next year. This year is the 20th year. And we have five runners who have done all Hellgates. So I think that's really cool. So it's really special. So I love, love directing Hellgate, although it just wipes me out. And I plan on continuing doing some long bike races in the future. Not well, but as well as I can.

Well, and Scotty, what's the year look like for you? For me, it's a month-by-month basis, seeing how the health goes and everything. But my goal this year is to hopefully go back to Europe and do maybe one of the 50Ks. A good friend of mine, Jacob Herbin, who is the race director for the Swiss Alps 100 events, puts on a fantastic race. It's one of the best up-and-coming Alp races. And he's really grown it. And it's something that's an alternative to going back to UTMB for sure. So I'm hoping that I can do that if I'm healthy. Getting back to what you said, AJ, earlier, I'm going to continue to devote my time to try and encourage younger runners to volunteer.

I think you get a lot out of the sport by volunteering that you can't get just running the events. And that's my big emphasis now is trying to tell people and mentor them into giving back to the sport, but also learning the sport by helping at races. So that's kind of my upcoming year, I think. You think you'll make it up to Auburn on the fourth Saturday in June? I've already got my airline reservation. Excellent. And I assume a volunteer spot somewhere or a pacing, crewing spot or something. Well, I'm going to put out a challenge to you and to myself to see if we can get Billy Yang to let us do maybe an hour or two of the live cast during the race.

I think if we're willing to do like 2 a.m. to 4 a.m., he probably would have no problem with that. I don't know about saying. We're not going to go and do that. All right. Well, I might know a guy. Let's talk about that offline. And then, John, what's your year look like? Assume you have some travel planned. I have a travel planned. I've been an inveterate traveler next year. We're actually going to Mexico over New Year's, which is a better time, Scotty, than October. I just want to say for the record. And that will mark the 50th consecutive year I've been outside the U.S. So that's my last remaining streak.

And it's something that all you have to do is get on an airplane to accomplish. I'm not really competing anymore, but I'm still kind of helping out here and there. And I want to say for the record, I was never half the runner that Scotty or David is and were. So it's okay if I'm the first one to bail. But we put on a fat-ass run here in Sedona on April 1st. It's a 50K, one big loop around town. So we don't have a time limit. So all y'all come out and participate. At least you three guys come participate in that.

We'll probably, again, captain an aid station for the Cocodona 250, which comes right by our house almost. And so that's always kind of fun because it's a different kind of thing. And then my wife, Lisa, she's still running pretty well. So I'm sure she's going to enter some stuff. I don't know what it is or where it's going to be. So I'll get stuck crewing and volunteering at whatever. And then the only other thing on my agenda is to show up at the press box of the football field at Placer High School in time to warm up the crowd for the first finisher of Western States and keep the microphone warm until 5 o'clock in the morning when it's a J.W.

two-hour emergency backup announcer spent at Western States. Well, and I got to say, you do an incredible job in that golden hour, which has just become even more and more of a thing. I mean, listeners out there, if you want to see, like, chaos in action, just see that press box between 10.30 and 11 in the morning on Western States Sunday. I want to just close by saying, you know, you guys know this, but it's worth, you know, the three of you in many ways have been a part of the arc of my running and my life, you know, for a quarter century and in very different ways. You know, maybe mentor is an overused word, but at the right time and in the right place, you know, we've connected.

And I think what's important for folks out there to realize is that every connection you have, whether it's with someone like these three on our Council of Elders or someone who in 20 years might be on the Council of Elders, those connections and those communication points and those flashpoints can make or break, you know, sort of future decisions and future things that you do in your life. I mean, I can think of times where all three of you have said something to me that I, you know, went away from that conversation thinking about and contemplating and probably making a better decision because of having that conversation than I would have had I not had that conversation. So this has been a real treat for me, John and Scott and David.

And I think it's so great that you're all still part of our family and will be for a long, long time to come. As anybody who's been listening over the last hour knows, these guys aren't going anywhere. And they're a big part of who we are, who we've been. And I think, as you heard this afternoon, who we want to become. So on behalf of the whole ultra running community and Jason Koop for handing over this podcast to me. Thank you. And thank you, John, David and Scott. See you guys next time. See you, AJ. See you, John. See you, Scotty. Wow, that was a blast.

I can't tell you how much it meant to me to get those three guys in the same room. Scotty Mills, John Medinger, David Horton. Over 120 years, ultra experience between them and just their wisdom and knowledge and sophistication. And the fact that they're still going at it, that they're still active, still involved, all in their 70s, contributing to the sport as truly the Council of Elders. It's just inspiring. So thank you for listening. Thank you for sharing in the inspiration. Thank you for indulging me in our conversation with the Council of Elders. And thank you, Jason Koop, for giving me this opportunity to record four episodes of the KoopCast.

I hope you all enjoyed it. And thank you especially to, in addition to David, Scotty, and John today. Thank you, Jason Green and Candice Burt, as well as Casey Licktie and Dylan Bowman for talking about what it's like to be coached by Coop. Now, I'm going to head back into my cave, and I'll see you out there on the trail sometime soon. Signing off, this is AJW for the KoopCast.