2024 Black Canyon 100K Preview | Analysis, Storylines, Predictions

Finn (00:01.328)
All right, we are back with another preview episode. This time the 2024 Black Canyon 100K, which is gonna be an absolute barn burner. But before we get to that, we haven't talked on air since the Javelina 100. So starting with you, Leah, what is up in your world and what's on the horizon?

Leah (00:20.458)
I went back to work and that's pretty sad. Yeah. Just learning how to balance all of that stuff all over again. So lots of 7 PM running because I don't know how to be a morning person. So living that life, trying to train for a six day race in March and, uh, trying to get ready to compete against Brett at the black Canyon 60 day.

Brett Hornig (00:22.604)
Woo!

Finn (00:23.548)
Oooo

Brett Hornig (00:45.75)
Oh, that's gonna be such a good one. I'm so glad it's live streamed.

Leah (00:47.735)
Hup

Finn (00:51.276)
Who's taking them on? What are the oddsmakers saying right now?

Leah (00:54.619)
Oh, Brett's got me good.

Brett Hornig (00:56.922)
I don't know, we'll see. Leah, you tend to do better with suboptimal lead ups to the race and then still having a good race. And us both being on course for the entire day, the day before our races, is actually probably going to benefit you way more than me.

Leah (01:14.062)
I know it's a, I feel like I'm kind of used to that, but, and I do have course advantage. I know I've been thinking a lot about that. I was like, I need to be seated for all of the live stream.

Brett Hornig (01:18.006)
I'm going to bring a chair.

Brett Hornig (01:26.018)
Yep, we got our priorities straight.

Leah (01:27.906)
Thank you.

Finn (01:29.416)
Maybe the Jeff Colt strategy of standing all day will pay off though, who knows?

Leah (01:33.506)
That's true.

Finn (01:36.06)
What's up with you Brett?

Brett Hornig (01:38.167)
Oh, what's going on?

Brett Hornig (01:42.234)
Dude, Black Canyon 60K, like this is my Super Bowl. Coincidentally, it's on the day of the Super Bowl. So, yeah, ready to throw down there. Yeah, what else we got? Getting ready for fatherhood. That's gonna be a good one. So, no races other than the Black Canyon 60K on the horizon for me as I prepare for my sedatical.

Leah (02:07.65)
Ha!

Finn (02:08.589)
Getting ready to raise a sub 220 marathon or maybe

Brett Hornig (02:12.462)
It could happen. You know, that's, that's totally their choice. I'm not going to push it on them.

Leah (02:16.334)
the

Finn (02:19.133)
Well, as we always do, I think it's important to kick off the preview with just notable observations, comments about what the course is looking like this year, any changes with aid stations, routing, stuff like that. Brett, what stands out to you in this department this year?

Brett Hornig (02:37.626)
Well, there's two things. The first, I always love to talk about the weather, as you know, and we're recording this like what 10 days out from the race or nine days out from the race. So it's probably still kind of too far of an extended forecast, but we're looking at like four or five days of rain slash showers and cooler temps leading up to the race, which is kind of unique. I mean, it's happened in a couple occasions, but those years,

2019. Those also forced an alternate course because the water levels through the rivers were pretty high. Their water levels through the rivers are pretty low this year. So it sounds like unless for some reason it rains a lot, they're still going to get to run the regular course, but it might just be cooler. And I was texting Jamil asking him like what the mud situation is like. And he said it oftentimes can get a little muddy with rain up on the top.

third of the course higher up, but once you start to descend after like mile 15, 20, it gets a little more gravelly and a little more rocky and that actually drains pretty well. So it doesn't really sound like it's going to be like a slot fest or anything. So who knows? I mean, we might just see some fast time. So all those coming from winter up in the mountains might luck out.

Finn (04:00.252)
The last couple of years have been markedly different. It's been sunshine, dry trails, hot course. If anyone out there wants to visualize what 24 could look like, there's a film, I'm not sure if it's on the Mountain Outpost or the Runs Deep, Get High channel, but it's covering the front of the race back in 2017, I think when Eric Sensman and Alex Nichols and maybe it was Elav Olsen were battling it out for a golden ticket. And then I think Claire Gallagher on the women's side.

snagged one that year too. Claire's running in like total rain gear. It's sloppy. It's cold. You know, you can see them shivering on a desert course. It's wild. So yeah, actually, and Leah, maybe I want to throw this to you. One of the questions that was posed, it was either on Twitter or Instagram, what happens to race tactics at Black Canyon if this weather holds? Like, if you're in the shoes of some of the runners lining up on race day,

Leah (04:35.566)
Thanks for watching!

Finn (04:58.384)
How does this change things for you? How do you approach things differently?

Leah (05:02.45)
Yeah, I feel like a lot of the athletes prepare for this race to be hot and to be desert weather. Most of these athletes are coming from the Mountain West and they've been in the sauna. I think the sauna is always beneficial for training and for adaptations regardless. But I think it changes mindset a lot. I think there's some people out there who might be banking on carnage a little bit more and banking on some people going out hot and suffering for it later.

I do think conditions make it tough when it's sloppy like this, but perhaps there might not be as much carnage from heat after mile 50 like there typically is.

Brett Hornig (05:42.658)
I got a question. Do you think like for cooler weather, it almost forces everyone to race a little bit more aggressively because in the heat, you know there's always gonna be a few that race aggressive and you can kind of sit back, let them go. Oftentimes you're gonna catch back up to them. In a cooler race like this, you're like, gosh, there's a much higher chance they don't ever come back. So then you're just kind of forced to go out with them. Are we gonna see?

Leah (06:08.958)
I think so. Yeah.

Brett Hornig (06:12.65)
a classic carnage race than this year if we get cooler weather or are we just going to see again like people not dying and just everyone runs stupid fast.

Finn (06:24.652)
I mean, I'm just thinking of, uh, there's just a lot of super fit people on this line and for the sake of raising their heart rates and staying as warm as possible, faster running may be necessary just to survive out there in the morning hours.

Brett Hornig (06:39.423)
I feel like we're really playing up this weather to be a lot gnarlier than it's probably gonna be.

Leah (06:44.078)
It's gonna be really pleasant.

Finn (06:45.471)
We got to build some drama. We got to sensationalize this.

Brett Hornig (06:49.114)
I mean, I've been checking it every day and the storm seems to be moving up. So now by like Sunday, it's actually looking sunny and very pleasant. So the 60K conditions are looking downright wonderful. But maybe the 100K might get that too if we check back in a few more days.

Finn (07:06.284)
Is there a significant aid station change this year too or a crew access point?

Brett Hornig (07:11.358)
Yeah, that was the other biggie. So one of the most pivotal crew access spots of the course had always been at Black Canyon City, which was mile 37. That is no longer a crew accessible aid station. The aid station is still there, but there won't be any crew allowed. And instead the crewable spot is at the previous aid station, which is now called Deep Canyon Ranch and it's in a slightly different spot than the, the like 50 K ish aid station last year. So now.

you will be able to crew your runner like mile 19, 32, and then 51. So the between that second and third crew spot, it gains, you know, six miles. So that's, I don't know if that seems kind of major to me, especially at the very front of the race. What do you think?

Leah (07:58.614)
I think that sounds major, specifically for the people who don't have a lot of longer distance races. So I think that big difference could play in the hands of people who have raced 100k, raced 100 milers, are kind of used to having to go a while without aid, without crew. Maybe for some of these newbies to the distance, that could be a little damaging.

Brett Hornig (08:25.026)
Yeah, because if you're not familiar with frantically actually grabbing things from the two aid stations that are in between your crew spot and you just skip things. We might see some even, we always seen big blowups from Black Canyon City to Table Mesa, but we might see even bigger blowups now that it's from Deep Canyon to Table Mesa.

Finn (08:48.048)
One question I have is whether, whether the weather, whether the weather impacts or influences the type of runner that is capable of winning this race. So if we do see a dramatic change from, you know, sun, heat, dry trails over to the mud, cold rain, wind, et cetera, does that open up opportunities for different types of runners, maybe like more strength based runners?

to have a great day here.

Leah (09:18.466)
I'd say yes and no. I think when you look at history at Black Canyon, we've seen success across the board of all types of runners from all locations. So last year, for example, we saw Anthony Costolis, Tom Evans, Cole Watson, kind of be in that podium spots for the men, kind of reigning from different parts of the world. Same with women like Healy Henninger from Pacific Northwest, used to training in a lot of mud, Heather Jackson, not used to a ton of trail...

trail running at that time, but training in Bend and then Arizona. Um, I think historically we might think of Black Canyon as a course that favors locals, favors people who often get to train in the desert. Um, maybe a little bit of weather like this will make it a bit more equalizer for some of our East coast friends that are coming out for the race. Um, I think a lot, especially on the men's side, we have, um, a few coming from the East coast who are training in.

some pretty rough winter conditions right now, so maybe they'll be used to some slop.

Finn (10:21.244)
What do you think, Brett?

Brett Hornig (10:22.455)
Yeah, definitely. One of the most interesting things of this course, regardless of the weather, I mean we see this whether it's hot or cold, is how you have to be weirdly good at clicking off some pretty fast miles in the first half, but then you have to be like that mountainous 100-miler grittiness in the second half.

Because even though the whole course is runnable and you know, those who are winning the races on the men's and women's side, they're probably running every single step. Like so much of the climbing is in the second half of the race that you all of a sudden have to have like kind of hardened mountain legs to succeed. But if you're only good at that, you're not going to, you're going to, you know, leave too much time on the table in the first half. So you have to have this weird, uh, you know, combination of decent leg speed and then be able to like,

just be gritty at the end. I think one of the best examples of that was, was Keely last year in just the way that she ran the race and kind of displayed both of those skill sets really evenly, which kind of makes us such a nice litmus test for Western States.

Finn (11:35.028)
Any other comments on course conditions, weather, before we get to some interesting stat lines that I want to present from our friend, Leah made station fireball.

Leah (11:46.742)
Um, this is probably not necessarily along the lines of like course and weather, but I think, um, around the race itself, we're seeing what I think is a little bit more of an international, uh, presence of athletes this year. And I think a lot of that has to do with it becoming part of the world trail majors. Um, I think it's the second race so far in the series, early season, which is kind of nice for those athletes who are targeting the majors because perhaps they can target an early season one. And maybe.

Brett Hornig (11:47.104)
is

Leah (12:16.022)
They can target something late in the season, like Ultra Trail Cape Town. So I think for an entrance list that is, as of today, 1,011 entrance deep. Like there's a lot of people in this race, so a lot of people that could then have the potential to be competitive in the World Trail Major Series at the end of the year.

Finn (12:26.425)
Yes.

Finn (12:34.716)
That is a great point. I'll also be really curious to track the buy-in over the course of the rest of the year into this series. We should also talk about the live stream that's gonna happen. I know both of you are a part of it on race day. Brett, what can you share that may or may not be new this year or rolled over from last year's presentation?

Brett Hornig (12:55.982)
So yeah, we're still getting briefed on kind of all the final instructions, but sounds like as of right now, Leah and I will be leapfrogging each other on the course, doing course commentary. So I have to try and do my best Leah impression out there, which now that I'm out of the comfort of the studio, I'm getting really nervous because being able to ID runners that quickly is...

definitely like a Lea superpower because like I'm like, oh yeah, I can ID the runners, but like I get to watch them on drones and stuff coming in. Like I got a solid like 30 seconds to like stand there and think before they come in. So now I'm really, I'm just getting thrown into the battlefield and I'm excited to be out there and get to experience it, but it's going to be a lot of fun. And I think one of the biggest things for the live stream is that the whole studio is going to be right at the finish line this year.

So, you know, hopefully that means for some more entertaining, like post race, just interviews with everyone being there and kind of hanging out. But yeah, I mean, it's going to be a good one. It's what Black Canyon Livestream has not been awesome.

Finn (14:15.928)
Yeah, I love that finish line studio. And I think one thing I'm excited to see built out even more is that like mixed zone style of content that you see in track and field and maybe getting more interview content at the finish line. And the athletes get a chance to kind of sit down, maybe eat a piece of pizza, rehydrate, talk some more reflect. And, uh, yeah, it'll be fun for the fans at home.

Brett Hornig (14:37.042)
You know, just lying in a cot, throwing up into a bucket. I'm just shoving a microphone in your face, making you tell me about all the carnage out there. Yeah, it's gonna be good. Live from drug testing, it's Brett Hornig.

Finn (14:40.957)
Yeah.

Leah (14:41.848)
You're good.

Leah (14:51.79)
I'm sorry.

Finn (14:53.878)
We got we got to do what we got to do more sling intent out there. Leah any thoughts on this year's media coverage and what you're excited about?

Brett Hornig (14:56.75)
Yeah.

Leah (15:05.362)
Yeah, gosh, last year was awesome. It was chaotic. We were like hopping around to as many spots as we could possibly get to and failing and flailing along the way. I feel like we worked out a lot of kinks throughout the day and I'm really excited to like have some of my like stationary spots this year. So I'm gonna be at, I think the start, Hidden Treasure at Mile, right around the half marathon mark, Gloriana.

right around mile 24 and then Table Mesa at mile 50. Last year, I don't know if I'll be able to get to Table Mesa for the whole, all the men coming through, but I remember last year Table Mesa was my absolute favorite spot to watch the women's race unfold because there's so much action happening and I think we'll see something very similar this year. So if you're gonna be out there spectating, Table Mesa is the place to be.

And I just think it's such a pivotal part of the race and just so much going on there.

Finn (16:03.804)
Do you see that as one of the major cruxes of the race too? Like were there a lot of lead or position changes there last year?

Leah (16:09.11)
There was, like I'm just thinking specifically about the women's field because that's what I was largely involved with last year. And I'm pretty sure we saw Ida Nielsen come in, maybe like, it was like Heather Jackson and Keely come in kinda together, but maybe Ida was in that mix too. And then we had like Anna Cashius and Meg Morgan and Shay right behind Ida and just, it was like, when all that scooping up happened was right in that, you know, two miles after.

table mesa, so you could just tell there was a lot that was about to happen, even through that aid station. I just remember turning my back, somebody would come through, I'd be like, oh my God, it's another woman, and just doing that for 10 minutes straight. So it was awesome, and I think we saw last year, Black Canyon's top 10 women were the fastest they've ever been, and that just made for a really dynamic, especially third through 10th positions. Not much time split many of those women up.

Finn (17:05.84)
I've got three categories of stats that I want to share from our friend and partner AidStationFireball who by the way, if you're a listener or a viewer out there, go get him a follow on Twitter, donate to his Patreon because of these stats that we're about to recite and comment on. But there's three categories. I've kind of self categorized them. The first one is around the evolution of this race.

friend of the podcast, Mike Mcmonagle said something, I think in an Instagram post shortly after last year's race, where he basically said, being out there photographing the event, witnessing it firsthand, he felt like he saw a watershed moment of professionalism in the sport, just based on the performances, how the race was conducted, how things played out. And the stats kind of bear it out. Both fields, Leah, you were talking about the women's field there, both fields saw

the fastest median finishing time for a top 10 finisher last year. And we've basically gotten to the point where if you wanna be in golden ticket contention on the men's side, you have to expect to run sub eight hours. On the women's side, sub nine 15. Of course, a lot of this stuff is weather course conditions dependent, but that's the way it's been trending on a normal year in the past three to four years. When you hear sort of like

these stats recited, Brett, what comes to mind for you?

Brett Hornig (18:31.826)
I'm just looking at them right now as you were kind of talking over it and I didn't realize how Massive of a jump in just side of the average times In the top 10 on the women's side from any year to last year like the average time got the average top 10 Got 40 minutes faster than the year before which was right about equal to the previous You know

faster time and you know kind of going back to what we were saying earlier is you can't really bank on people blowing up anymore because there's You know, I mean we all went through the start list and try it We're you know, we can try our best at making a top five pick here, but on like both sides There's probably 30 men and 30 women who are fit enough to be in the top five But then it really comes down to

Leah (19:23.245)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (19:29.358)
the factors outside of your fitness, like the actual race day decisions, like who is actually going to continue eating 100 grams of carbs an hour into the into the seventh, eighth, ninth hour of the race, who's gonna, you know, not push too hard at on the climb out of table Mesa, or out of Black Canyon City, it's going to be like little

Leah (19:41.419)
Thank you.

Brett Hornig (19:56.346)
tiny details that are going to make or break the race and determine the difference between like first or, you know, eighth place. You know, kind of what you said to Finn or it's like, I guess what Mike said or that just comes down to like the more professional you are in regards to your whole build up and the race, the more success you're probably going to have. Is the True Heart Brown era over?

where someone comes in and just goes out hard, people let them go, stays off the front, like he's holding a plastic handheld. He did it old school. Will we see that anymore?

Finn (20:24.738)
Seriously.

Leah (20:31.054)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (20:42.328)
I mean, we're even, yeah, we're seeing this from the, we're hearing this, I should say, from the athletes themselves. Like we had Zach Miller on the show a few weeks ago and we were kind of reflecting, reminiscing on the 2017 UTMB. And like one of the first things Zach said was, you know, that version of me, I don't even recognize anymore. That's like a, such an inferior version of myself. The sport was so different back then. Like you could,

barely cracked 22 hours at that race and either be on the podium or win. And like, not only is, not only should we question, like, is the true heart Brown era over, but like, is, is the current version of professional athletes in the sport vastly different than even the version that existed like three or four years ago in 2019, let alone, you know, the random ballers and stuff like that. Leah, what do you think?

Leah (21:31.366)
Yeah, I mean, I think we had this discussion before we hit record, and I'm going to echo it right now. Like, this entrance list is the deepest for, I think, a domestic race that we've covered ever. Like, I actually think this is deeper than some of the Western states competitors that we've seen over the years. Maybe not the top end talent, but maybe also.

kind of the top end talent as well, but definitely deep. Um, I mentioned there's a little bit of international competition coming to this race, but from like a North American perspective, I can't get over just the athletes and how they're training these days. So just going through and, um, going through, like let's say for the women's field, for example, I feel like even this time last year, it was pretty easy to separate what we would consider like world-class.

or national class apart from, you know, this other class of like sub elite, maybe right about to like make their big break. The women's training that I'm seeing, everybody is doing extremely, extremely great training for these races. So it's so hard to kind of pick and choose who's going to be the fittest on race day because everybody's just putting a great effort out there. And I think it's going to get harder and harder to predict. Yeah, who's going to come away with podium spot from these races.

Finn (23:00.072)
I joked on Instagram earlier today that we need to hire an oceanographer because the depth is so deep. We're talking Marianas trench levels of depth here at Black Canyon, unseen before. There is no precedent. This is insane.

Leah (23:16.526)
Somebody needs to take your Instagram away from you.

Finn (23:18.736)
Hahaha!

Brett Hornig (23:21.354)
I'm glad that we now finally have, we have like an image that we can put with the depth is deep quote of maybe just like a profile line of the Marianas Trench. Like the Titanic sinking down it with it saying like the depth is deep on it. Oh, Eric Lupumo, I know you're not gonna listen to this before the race, but maybe if you listen to it for some reason after the race, can you please make us up, mock us up a logo of that? Thank you.

Leah (23:37.559)
that's cool.

Leah (23:46.688)
the

Finn (23:48.88)
All right, the next category of stats is whether or not Black Canyon is a reliable predictor of success, relative success at Western. Two stats here. Black Canyon has given golden tickets to five people who went on to podium at Western, which is the most of any golden ticket race since 2016. That list include Anthony Costales, Amy Sproastin, Tyler Green, Casey Lichtig, Alex Nichols, and then...

of all the golden ticket winners at this race since 2016, 81% have gone on to finish no lower than 13th place in their follow-up Western. So really solid consistency. No outright winners directly from this race, but amazing consistency and high level performance. Does that surprise you guys at all?

Brett Hornig (24:28.762)
Hmm.

Leah (24:38.034)
You know, I think something that was interesting when I was glancing at those two was two steps. I felt like there was a difference between men and women performances at Western States from Black Canyon. I almost felt like the men seemed to have better Western States performances than the women did who were golden ticket winners from here. I don't know why that would be, but that was a pretty interesting stat that I saw. But I will say...

correlating any success at Black Canyon to Western States. I think it makes sense. Black Canyon starts out with a 20 mile slight downhill, and then you have to get pretty gritty for the last 40 miles on these like punchy, rolling, gravelly, rocky terrain. And you kind of have to go from your runnable legs into your more just like resilient mountain legs to some degree. I know it's not truly mountain running, but they're hills. And I think Western States is kind of similar. You start with

only start with kind of, it's almost the opposite, but I think that type of runner, you need to show both skillsets at Black Canyon and you also need to show both skillsets at Western States. So I'm not really surprised that these runners have had success. I also think the timing of the season is extremely nice. Like February to June, it kind of sets you up really well.

Finn (25:48.124)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Brett Hornig (25:51.69)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, you get you actually have time to put in like you get to fully peak a race black canyon rest Full build for Western states where you know, we've seen people have success after you know, Lake Sonoma canyons 100k But it's definitely a luxury to have the time to dedicate towards like more Western state specific training another variable Leah that I think

helps with like that Black Canyon has, that Western States also has, is in most years, is the heat element as well. Whereas, you know, if you're able to, you know, race well, and you know, 70 degrees isn't as hot as Western States, but 70 degrees in February is pretty hot feeling. So when you're able to manage that, that's just another thing. It's like, okay, you check that box for then for Western States.

Finn (26:47.341)
Yeah.

Leah (26:48.89)
Something that also came to mind kind of unrelated to this Western States success, but it's kind of related to Western States, is I talked about the 1011 entrance that we're seeing this year. I think something that's adding to the competition at Black Canyon this year is the fact that Bandera 100K was not a golden ticket race this year. So we used to get kind of the splitting of competition, Black Canyon. I mean, Bandera was historically a little less competitive than Black Canyon for the last couple of years. But

Like it would take away some competition this year. The only things that would have taken away competition in Golden Ticket races in theory was like javelina back in October. So I think we're seeing a lot of these like athletes who are training through the winter. This is the race that they're choosing.

Finn (27:33.68)
That's a great point. I mean, as late as 2019, there were five golden ticket races in succession, you know, Bandera, Black Canyon, Georgia Death Race, Lake Sonoma, Canyons. So yeah, the consolidation here as a result of just stuff spread out through the year. That's a great point. Last stat line here is just talking about the general competitiveness of the race and how much you have to be

in it, like really from start to finish, which we've talked about almost ad nauseum in our last, like three to four preview episodes, but holy shit, this race is point like a toy girl as gold member would say the men's race has had the podium separated by less than 10 minutes in three, the last four years. And on the women's side, it's been separated by less than 10 minutes in two of the last four. That's wild to me. Like there's that tell like there are, there's a chance.

that, you know, two Saturdays from now, Saturday from now, we're seeing like, you know, true racing in the last five, the 10 K of this race among podium and golden ticket contenders does, I mean, that probably doesn't, but does, what do you guys think about that? Does it surprise you?

Leah (28:51.987)
Go ahead, Britt.

Brett Hornig (28:54.039)
That's the way ultra running is going. We saw it last year with how long it took to figure out who was going to win the race. On the women's side, it took 50 miles for the eventual leader to finally take the lead for good. On the men's side, Cole tried to break the field around the 50k mark and

you know, 10 years ago or even five years ago, that's the move that wins the race. But you had Anthony and Tom like, Oh, no, that's too early. Like we're already going fast enough. That's too early. Um, and then the move didn't get made until after black Canyon city somewhere in the forties where, you know, then Cole wasn't able to respond to that move. Um, and then even then it was still like, not sure if.

Anthony had fully broken Tom until again like the final 10 miles. So Yeah, I mean kind of going back to your stat And and I was looking at some of the historical splits too where it was like how fast were people through? bumblebee through you know, like Gloriana and it was you know, like Ten men all came in and left together like ten women all came in and left together there

It just, the races are packing up for at least the first half, probably even longer now. And then it's going to be who, as of right now, it's who doesn't slow down. I don't think you need to make an aggressive move to win the race yet. And you know, it's still going to be like a, you know, Anthony died the least last year. Maybe in five more years, it won't be like that where it's like, who can then all of a sudden run

Finn (30:40.514)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (30:47.598)
their last 10K a handful of minutes faster than the 10K before that. We're not seeing that yet, but I bet we're getting closer. And yeah, that might then bring out like a whole new different type of runner, a different skillset to what it takes to win this race.

Finn (31:04.512)
I am almost positive that at some point early on in the live stream between the start and Bumblebee, we're going to see frequent pans, drone pans to like a 20 person horde of runners reliably staying in a pack. How long does some version of that pack stay together and what will be the largest pack that we see late in the race, relatively speaking, maybe spread out by hundreds of feet. I'm really curious to see.

Brett Hornig (31:17.492)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (31:17.611)
Mm.

Leah (31:28.126)
Yeah. Maybe. I just recall last year at Bumblebee, at Gloriana, we, and that was mile 20, mile 24. Oh, 20, easily 20 men early on. I just remember trying to spit off every single name running past and you don't know who they are. They're all jumbled together. Like huge packs, at least through mile 20, like we're going to see 30 people still together for men's race. Probably.

Brett Hornig (31:56.801)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (31:57.582)
20 on the women's side. Table Mesa, mile fifth. Oh, no. Black Canyon City, which we're not going to have this year, but that's around the mile 35 mark or so usually. That last year, we were seeing like within five minutes, a good 10 men last year, I think. But I think that's where it truly starts breaking apart, is that mile 36 or so, 35.

Brett Hornig (32:16.143)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (32:23.134)
Yeah, I totally agree with that because by as runners were leaving Black Canyon City last year, there was a split where it was like Cole, Anthony and Tom. And then there was maybe like two minutes and then it was like fourth through 15th place were all still together trying to reel them in and Cole got mixed up in the shuffle of that before he came back to life. But then Tom and Anthony were the only ones that ended up staying away.

I could totally, you know, as we get into like the preview of the fields, I could totally see a similar scenario with that with a handful of names on this list.

Leah (33:05.066)
Yeah. Yeah, I think what, why we see that breaking point there typically too is the first 20 miles is, it's so easy. Like it's slightly downhill, you are just, gravity's taking you, you are not putting out any effort. Around the 20 mile mark is when you start to do a little bit of climbing. And then right around the 50K mark, before you then come down to Black Canyon City, that's where you start to do a significant amount of climbing compared to the rest of the course.

Finn (33:06.607)
Yep.

Finn (33:18.46)
Sorry.

Leah (33:33.502)
So I think that amount, that transition from all downhill to like, okay, now you need to actually start using your legs kind of shocks a lot of the runners. And that's where we start to see some of the breaking happen.

Finn (33:46.668)
Yep. Should we get into the women's field?

Leah (33:52.406)
Yeah, let's do it.

Brett Hornig (33:53.562)
I'm ready.

Finn (33:54.804)
I have so many questions, but I think maybe just to start, Leah, when we say this field is deep, how many women approximately do you believe are in contention for, let's say, one of the three golden tickets?

Leah (34:11.554)
I have 25 listed. And I think I calculated a roughly 12 to 13 of those are coached by Megan and David Roach, which is really fun.

Brett Hornig (34:23.082)
Yeah that was fun to play the-

Finn (34:23.758)
We're probably celebrating no matter what on Saturday.

Leah (34:26.526)
I think they're going to be out there too, which will be fun.

Brett Hornig (34:26.756)
that.

Brett Hornig (34:30.378)
Yeah, the Strava stalking, playing the game of are they a swap athlete was kind of fun. I have like lots of question marks written next to a lot of names on my notes here, which is I have six pages of name like runner notes. And I think that's a record for pre-race notes that I've ever taken. Yeah, there's a lot of people.

Leah (34:46.508)
Yeah.

Leah (34:54.598)
Yeah, I know we'll probably talk about like how we categorized our runners and things like that. But I think I didn't do this for the men's field, but maybe one of you guys did. But something I thought was interesting to look at was the number of women in this field who have either earned a golden ticket in the past or missed it by two or less spots. And from my top 25 women that I pulled out, there's 10 women who have...

Finn (34:59.568)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (35:17.521)
Mmm, that's a good one.

Finn (35:23.078)
Wow.

Leah (35:23.838)
kind of been in that golden ticket contention in about the last like five years or so.

Finn (35:30.33)
in tra-

Brett Hornig (35:30.998)
That is a big number. Like, and even like, okay, I'm on that list. Like, do you have Alison Baca on that list? Because I don't think she ever got a golden ticket, but she's been pretty competitive at Western States.

Leah (35:40.141)
No.

Mm-mm.

Leah (35:46.494)
Yeah, and like Cat Bradley too, Cat Bradley, won Western States but never won a golden ticket. Both Allison and Cat got into Western States off the lottery.

Brett Hornig (35:48.865)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (35:55.07)
Yeah, so there's like, even amongst how giant that list is of people who've been in Golden Kitten Ticket, Golden Ticket Contention or God in Golden Ticket, there's still like heavy haters not on that particular list.

Leah (36:07.198)
Yes, and I think even potentially heavier hitters who aren't even on this list.

Brett Hornig (36:12.551)
Yes, 100%.

Finn (36:14.464)
I would love to know the average amount of attempts it takes for any given runner who is trying to get a golden ticket to actually secure one. Like, is it two, is it three, is it one? I have no idea.

Leah (36:27.102)
That's a good question.

Brett Hornig (36:28.638)
Yeah, that might be a future aid station fireball stat. It wouldn't, I mean, I know we definitely see some people who play the long game and like get better over the course of five or six years, but like in the marathon world, is some like 90 plus percent of elite marathoners set their lifetime PR within their first three marathons? Because you kind of like, you kind of figure out about how good you're going to be. And then like the wear and tear of training for it.

Leah (36:48.27)
Thanks.

Brett Hornig (36:58.418)
really adds up, you have your few exceptions, but I wonder if we're going to see some people like if you don't hit a golden ticket within your first like three races, assuming one of them actually goes well, like will you be able to make that jump in improvement to be in that spot? And that's kind of a somewhat demoralizing way to phrase that, but I'm just curious if we're getting to that point where it's like...

Leah (37:15.776)
Yeah.

Finn (37:15.842)
Yeah.

Leah (37:18.23)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (37:25.27)
Yeah, I mean, you could qualify for the trials and run 217 for the marathon, but like you're never going to make the Olympic team because chances are that person that trained their ass off to run 217 is not going to run 207.

Finn (37:38.192)
to know your fate already is interesting.

Leah (37:40.323)
Thank you.

Brett Hornig (37:41.366)
Yeah, like when Jim ran like 1408 at Western States, I was like, Oh, he killed Western States. It's not fun anymore.

Finn (37:50.628)
Hahaha

Leo, what are your categories?

Leah (37:56.226)
Um, you know, there's not, I've got a lot of categories this time and there's a lot of people who fall into a lot of buckets. Um, so my first, these categories aren't my best, but I feel like they get the point across my number one category says VVV fast slash has run a hundred miler. Um, so these are the people, these are the people. So extremely fast. So these are kind of like the women who have.

Brett Hornig (38:05.424)
The overlapping Venn diagram.

Brett Hornig (38:19.59)
What?

Leah (38:24.374)
shown themselves at like faster 100 milers and or run fast marathons and have succeeded at 100 milers. Then there's also the VVV Fast hasn't finished 100 milers. So these are like our extreme road marathon speedy people who might be successful in more of like the 50K realm of the sport but are just finally tipping over into the 100K realm.

Brett Hornig (38:28.097)
Okay.

Brett Hornig (38:43.289)
Okay.

Leah (38:52.33)
And then I have our very, very fast and consistent runners who might not be that top-end marathon speed, but are consistently competing at the highest level and doing it well over the years. So a couple of the people that fill those categories. So where should I start? Let's talk about our, I think, very, very fast and have run 100 milers. Allison Baca.

Finn (39:19.592)
VVVVV 100 mile.

Leah (39:22.318)
Allison Baca, Heather Jackson, and Kat Drew. So Allison Baca, man, she excites me because she can do so much in the sport. She's got extreme leg speed. She's just recently coming off a 242 CIM, where I believe she was trying to go for the standard and fell a little bit short. And we also saw her sixth place at the world mountain trail running championships this year, I think being the top USA.

woman in that race. Extremely talented. And I love to see her put it all together in races this last year. And I think Black Canyon will really suit her strengths. We mentioned that she did run Western States a couple of years ago, 2022. I think she was just outside the top 10 running around 21 hours and change. I think 50, about 100 K is her sweet spot. And I'm really excited to see her here.

Brett Hornig (39:52.474)
Mm-hmm. Wow.

Brett Hornig (40:17.706)
Wow, I didn't know she was that fast. That's cool.

Leah (40:19.682)
She's so fast. Yeah, she comes from a prior, I think triathlon background as well. Is that right? Yeah. Heather Jackson, I think we know Heather Jackson well at this point. She is the only woman in this field who's already in the Western States in like our more competitive field, I would say. So Heather was second here last year, only by two minutes. Ran a great race and we just saw her just.

Brett Hornig (40:39.226)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (40:47.734)
blow Javelina out of the water this fall, running extremely aggressive. So I'm really excited to see how she attacks Black Canyon because I think if she does it similarly to how she ran Javelina, we are in for a show.

Brett Hornig (41:04.366)
Do you think she will? Because this is kind of a no pressure race for her.

Leah (41:06.135)
I think so.

I think she is going to go for it. And if to remind the listeners of how Heather ran, have Alina, she went out at men's course record pace for the first 100K and was doing it well and was running around like fifth place overall, fifth or sixth place overall for much of that first 100K and held on extremely well running, I think 1430 or so.

Brett Hornig (41:25.335)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (41:37.675)
Micro fade.

Finn (41:38.864)
Microphage, yeah.

Leah (41:38.922)
Yeah, it was really, really impressive. That style of racing scares the crap out of me. I will probably never race that way, but I love watching Heather do it because she's so good at just staying gritty whenever it starts hurting really bad.

Brett Hornig (41:42.668)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (41:54.976)
Eric Lapuma, if you're ever listening, please make a logo for Microfade as well.

Leah (41:58.862)
Hahaha.

Brett Hornig (41:59.838)
Yeah, you can take that however you want.

Finn (42:01.99)
Hehehehe

Leah (42:02.878)
Um, my last person in this VV fast has run a hundred miler category is Kat Drew. Uh, I'm really excited to see her here. So she took pretty much all of 2023 off from anything that had a hundred in the name is how she wrote. Um, so she was kind of burnt out by the a hundred K a hundred mile distance and went back to 50 K and like road running a good bit, just to kind of stoke her fire a little bit more. And she's really.

Brett Hornig (42:20.259)
Hmm.

Leah (42:32.034)
really good at the 50K distance. We saw her battle it out with Claire Gallagher at Chuck-A-Nut last year. I think she was just behind Claire in that race. And then she threw down a 324 50K at Calgary Marathon in 50K last year. And that is like 6.30-ish pace, I believe. One of the faster 50Ks in North America last year by a woman.

Brett Hornig (42:48.122)
Gosh, it's very fast.

Finn (42:52.643)
Lord Almighty.

Leah (42:58.394)
I think taking that year kind of off from the longer distance probably did her pretty well and I think she's probably energized coming into this. I do believe she's had a Black Canyon attempt and perhaps finished before. I think this course suits her well. I think having the leg speed and then having course experience, she's also gotten a golden ticket, a Canyon's 100K and.

raised her way into Western States for a top 10 finish before. So I'm curious if she wants to get back to Western States once more.

Finn (43:29.279)
Mm.

Finn (43:32.428)
Yeah, I mean, one thing I think about with Heather Jackson, she is this is year two of her trail running experiment and like another stat again, like calling to the heavens calling to Liam May station fireball. Like, what is the common trajectory to hitting your peak in the sport from a year over a year standpoint? Like, like Brett, like you were saying earlier with the marathon, like on your third attempt, you kind of figure out the zone of your peak in the sport or at that distance. How many years in the sport does it take to really flesh out like

what your identity is, how good you can be, stuff like that.

Brett Hornig (44:05.474)
Well, one thing that's really cool that we're seeing about the sport with advancements in training science and especially nutrition is that people are maintaining their peak racing years longer. You know, it used to be, again, going back to the great Ryan Guelphie, he was like, you get three years to be good at the sport because 90% of ultra runners are absolutely torched after three years. And when you look at 2016 prior,

and you look at people who are winning races, he was for the most part right. And then there was a small handful of people that continued to run well beyond three years. We're seeing that less now where we're seeing people be good year after year after year. It's like, I totally thought Walmsley was gonna be burnt out after like two or three years, but I think he's adopted enough of the kind of new age training science. We're seeing like you had said too,

the reinventing of Zach Miller, that's prolonging his career, not only just to be able to do it, but be able to do it at the very highest level. So, you know, for someone like Heather, like she might have like, she might have another decade in this sport.

Finn (45:23.532)
Yeah, yeah. Leah, in your opinion, if you had to predict on race day, how many runners in this women's field are capable of breaking nine hours?

Leah (45:24.391)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (45:38.944)
of like

Finn (45:40.912)
Because only seven have done it in history.

Leah (45:43.146)
I think 15 in this field could. I do. I don't think 15 are going to do it, but I think there's 15 women in this field on a good weather day that could, especially if they brought just the most out of each other. What I do really like about this field, and I'll touch on it in my next category, is just like the style of racers we have too. I love seeing like Rachel Drake and MK Sullivan in this field. I think...

Brett Hornig (45:46.882)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (46:11.37)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (46:11.618)
They've competed in really, really competitive 50 Ks and like short distance, uh, mountain runs. Same with Rachel Tomachak, who's this will be her first, um, 100 K. I'm probably one of her first ultra distances as well. I think she's only run, uh, maybe one or two ultra marathons, but these women know how to race and race like hard for the entirety of a race. Um, so I'm curious whenever you're lining up this many women with that competitive fire.

how hard they'll push each other and yeah, what they can get out of the others.

Finn (46:50.524)
What do you got for another category?

Leah (46:52.926)
Um, let me just dive into that category. So those were like my top end speedsters who haven't run a hundred miler, not saying you need to run a hundred miler, I just needed a way to. Separate these categories quite frankly. Um, so in this category and Brett, maybe you can dive into her a little bit because I feel like you've got some specialized knowledge is Marcy Climack. So how you say it?

Finn (47:02.256)
Ha ha ha.

Brett Hornig (47:09.219)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (47:16.471)
Yeah, Marcy's going to be a fun one to watch out there because I think she's got the fastest marathon PR of the field. It was just from a couple years ago and it's 230 flat. 230. That's well under the trials mark. Anyway, Marcy's dabbled in trail stuff just on and off. She's a Southern Oregon local.

living actually out in Montana at the moment. But yeah, dabbled in trail, mostly just to kind of break up the road racing. But then last year decided to go more all in on trail and just first true like training and racing of a trail race was the Waldo 100K where she then won it outright in a course record.

Finn (47:53.884)
Thanks for watching!

Brett Hornig (48:08.222)
Waldo 100k isn't as competitive as it once was, but if anyone goes back and looks at the top 10 list, it's a who's who of ultra running royalty from the Waldo 100k. I talked to her after the race and she was like, oh, it was miserable. There was so many things I did wrong, etc. Clearly, the talent is there. The fitness is going to be there. But

Leah (48:29.911)
Thanks.

Brett Hornig (48:37.05)
The biggest difference between Waldo and Black Canyon is there are so many more distractions at Black Canyon with competition for one, and just the chaos of the aid stations, crewing like actually having, like Marcy didn't have to be fast through any of the aid stations at Waldo. You have to be fast through the aid stations here at Black Canyon. So, there's gonna be some question marks there, but she might be fit enough to,

Finn (48:55.437)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (49:05.582)
be able to make a few of those little mistakes. Can't do anything major, but yeah, definitely on your very, very fast, but hasn't run 100 mile yet list. That's definitely a good one, someone to watch out for.

Leah (49:21.417)
Yeah.

Finn (49:22.224)
I got to add to that because we have a very interesting person alert here too. I went to her bio page on the Cascadia Elite Team website. Her current obsessions include the James Webb Telescope, which is like an upgraded version of the Hubble Telescope, a family of hummingbirds that share her front porch and learning to play the fiddle. That's amazing.

Brett Hornig (49:29.944)
Hmm.

Brett Hornig (49:42.754)
I didn't know any of those things. I only talked to Marcy about running. Ha ha ha.

Leah (49:47.246)
Thank you.

Finn (49:48.141)
So, very interesting personal alert, dude, not just a great runner.

Leah (49:51.562)
She's multidimensional. Yeah, I wanted to add to Waldo is a 22 year old race. So like you said, that's a who's who of like the 2010s largely, but like that race has been around for a minute. So breaking a course record there and then beating all the men, that's pretty cool. And on an imperfect minute. Oh, I love it. Let's see here. So then I also had Rachel Drake in that category. If anybody followed Rachel Drake's CIM this year,

Brett Hornig (49:54.226)
Cool.

Brett Hornig (50:03.202)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (50:11.23)
Yeah, absolutely.

Leah (50:21.394)
It was extremely impressive. Textbook, beautiful. Her and Peyton Thomas ran, uh, I'm pretty sure the entire race together and just put together a beautiful 235 qualifying for the Olympic, uh, marathon trials. Um, and she's foregoing her spot in the trials to run Black Canyon, which I think just speaks to her love for the trail running world and speaks to like what she's really after, which is a great race here at Black Canyon.

Brett Hornig (50:22.397)
Oh, textbook.

Finn (50:50.576)
Great vote for our sport.

Leah (50:52.642)
Totally, totally. Yeah, Rachel just had a phenomenal year. She kind of focused a little bit more on the shorter stuff this summer, going into OCC, and then put herself in the mix at OCC and did it extraordinarily well with a sixth place finish. Had like a rough return to running postpartum earlier in the season, but then just came back stronger than ever. She's like not somebody that you're gonna see do extraordinarily high mileage, but what she does works really, really well for her.

Brett Hornig (50:53.655)
Yeah.

Leah (51:22.638)
Um, she's run 100 K before I believe it was the 2019 CCC where she was in the top 10 there. So she has experience. She's done a hundred K it's been a minute. Um, so if anything, like, I think that could be one question mark for me, but I think having such household experience with the longer distance and then having like the grit and resilience at the shorter, uh, 50 K and other mountain races she's done, I think will bode extremely well for her.

Brett Hornig (51:50.454)
I'm so happy that Rachel is back to peak running form because I feel like there was a whole crop of trail fans that came about post-COVID. And Rachel ran really well on the Golden Trail Final I think in 2020. But then like pregnant postpartum, that took out a chunk of race time and a lot of people didn't know who Rachel Drake was. And it was like, oh, I can't wait for all these people to learn who Rachel is. And then now that she's back doing

Rachel things. Everyone's like, who is this? I was like, no, she's Rachel's like the OG. So excited that she's running Black Canyon and what I assume is a golden ticket attempt.

Finn (52:26.501)
Amen.

Leah (52:26.606)
total.

Leah (52:36.578)
I believe so. And I think coming off a recent short course race in Hong Kong, that was still a three hour something race. I think that was a great training effort and great proof of her fitness coming into this. I think she was definitely in the top five overall, maybe fourth overall there, breaking a course record and beating all the women in the field by 20 plus minutes in, I forget, about 20 mile race.

Brett Hornig (52:55.736)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (53:01.046)
One thing, she's crude and paced Tyler. Did Tyler win this race or second?

Leah (53:06.678)
He got second to sense.

Finn (53:10.252)
I think he won back in 2021. I think he actually, he had a pretty great, he had a pretty tactical run too, because I think he was in third place at Black Canyon City and then took the lead and won. It was one of those really interesting, come from behind years.

Brett Hornig (53:10.458)
Is it Erickson? I forget.

Brett Hornig (53:15.982)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (53:22.05)
But Rachel paced him for the last section. So Rachel at least has like the neurons connected of running very fast the last 10 miles. And that's a good thing to have.

Leah (53:24.939)
Yes.

Finn (53:34.188)
Yeah. Yes.

Leah (53:34.41)
Rachel also proceeded to run the 60K the next day and crush me. So she has, she knows the first 35 miles very well too. So I think she actually has probably seen roughly the entire course, which I think is helpful for a race like Black Canyon too.

Brett Hornig (53:47.076)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (53:53.758)
Yeah, absolutely.

Leah (53:56.07)
Um, let me just go through these. Then I, like I mentioned MK Sullivan, um, another top 10 at the world trail and mountain running championships in the 40 K this year, I think that race was probably her best race to date, but also has been super competitive in the golden, uh, trail series the last couple of years. We'll be stepping it up in distance as well. I believe she was going to run CIM too, but, uh, for went that just to like recover a little bit more this winter and dive a bit more into this training. Um, a couple other names in this category.

Brett Hornig (54:21.786)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Leah (54:25.006)
Kat Short and Sarah Beal, both very fast. Sarah Beal, I think has a sub 240 marathon to her name, JFK course record, has had several golden ticket race attempts now, her closest being a fifth place at Canyon's 100K back in 2022. And then I had a rough go last year at a few golden ticket attempts. So hopefully waiting, hopefully for her to put it together here at this race.

Brett Hornig (54:54.682)
There's a lot of cats in the race this year. There's three.

Leah (54:58.564)
Yeah.

Finn (54:59.004)
Wow.

Brett Hornig (55:02.126)
That's all.

Leah (55:06.667)
Um, and then let me just, you want me to dive into my last category here? So my just like consistent performers who are always at the top end, which Lucy Bartholomew and Marie Madden, Shay Oculano, uh, Lauren Pruitt, Arden Young, Becca Wendell, Anna McKenna, and Riley Brady. Um, Lucy Bartholomew, like no stranger to any of us has gotten third to Western States. I know really wants to get back to Western States.

Finn (55:10.108)
Sure.

Brett Hornig (55:10.517)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (55:25.323)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (55:32.002)
transitioned, I think from being coached by David Roach this past summer, um, it's being coached by Jason Koop and that transition happened right before UTMB, I believe. And she did her UTMB, uh, Kona double, which was pretty cool to follow, uh, got 10th place at UTMB. And I think has since been training very specifically, uh, for black Canyon. And I believe has been in Arizona now for probably at least the last two weeks. So I think she'll be solid. Um, her training has been, yeah, very specific, pretty like

Brett Hornig (56:00.535)
It's looked really good.

Leah (56:01.96)
Emails, yeah.

Brett Hornig (56:03.706)
Mm hmm. Yeah.

Finn (56:05.893)
One of my first introductions to the sport was back in 2018. I was at Western States Training Camp, had the chance to meet her, great person. And then she put on a really interesting clinic type race at Western that year. I mean, was leading the race for a while, kind of micro faded to third, but yeah, really exciting. I hope she gets back into Western too.

Leah (56:27.63)
I think it'd be awesome. And I feel like she is somebody who, even if she doesn't have her day at Black Canyon, I think we'll see her at Canyons, because I think that is her goal this year.

Finn (56:39.611)
Um, cool.

Leah (56:39.806)
Um, let me see here. Yeah. And I think, um, on that list, Anne Marie Madden is a fun one. She just, um, she won the master's division at CIM this year running 244. Um, and she's I believe 42 or 43 years old and has gotten a golden ticket at black Canyon once before. Uh, and yeah, I think she's solid. She just has such a history in the sport. Um, way back to like some podium finishes at the North Face 50

So I love to see her on start lines. Cause I think every time we see her race, she just is consistent, works her way up, knows what she's doing and is just a complete expert.

Finn (57:17.124)
that the golden ticket year where she got that ticket, I think it was 2022. It was the year that Dominique Estelle Mock blew up, Claire won. I think Anne-Marie was maybe 20, 25 minutes back at Black Canyon City. And she was one of the outliers in that whole kind of stat we were talking about where she was that far back, but kind of ran textbook in the last half of the race to get into podium golden ticket position. Really impressive.

Leah (57:44.722)
Yeah, she's part of the Canadian contingent that we're going to see at Black Canyon. For whatever reason, maybe they just want to escape their brutal winters up there, but Black Canyon always does a good job of attracting our Canadian friends. So on the women's side, that's going to be Kat Short. She's Canadian but lives in Hawaii. Kat Drew, Anne Marie Madden, Arden Young, and Genevieve Asselin-Demers. So pretty, five of them, pretty solid.

Brett Hornig (57:49.1)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (58:08.508)
We're just missing Ailsa McDonald. I feel like she should be there.

Leah (58:11.082)
Hang on. You're right.

Finn (58:17.525)
Should we go into pics here?

Leah (58:20.69)
Yeah, anything anybody else that you guys want to add that they really dive deep into?

Brett Hornig (58:21.031)
Yeah, I guess.

Brett Hornig (58:26.548)
Is Tara Dower racing?

Leah (58:28.252)
Oh, I believe she is, yeah.

Brett Hornig (58:29.978)
Okay, yeah, because she was 12th last year, I think. Yeah, 12th last year amongst, I've got like, I think five returners from the top 15. Heather Jackson, second, Anna Cash is fourth. Oh, Anna Cash is not running this year though. Shay Aquilano, sixth. And then Nicole Hanson was 13th. So, definitely got a handful. And then there was a whole bunch from like 2022 who raced and-

Finn (58:34.779)
Yep.

Leah (58:57.934)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (58:59.19)
are coming back. So a lot of people who have logged some solid miles on this course.

Leah (59:07.494)
Yeah. And I think, um, somebody like Shay, I think she was only like two minutes, a minute or so behind. She was in sixth place. I think a minute or so behind Eda who is in fifth place and not far behind Anna. Last year. Um, I think what the experience she's gained this last year definitely has some opportunity to, uh, make up some time on her splits from last year. Uh, and she put in a typical like little Shay training weekend too, with like a 22, 20, 10.

Finn (59:18.767)
Thank you.

Leah (59:35.702)
10, 13, all in like a three day period.

Brett Hornig (59:39.222)
You know who Shay Aquilano's training kind of reminds me of is Casey Lictegs. A lot of it's pretty quick, pretty consistently quick, pretty high mileage, and very flat. But then for some reason that just equals running well on trails.

Leah (59:44.919)
Yeah.

Leah (59:48.696)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (59:57.09)
so well. Yeah.

Finn (59:58.432)
What did we call that John Ray training strategy where he did like the six runs in a 48 hour span separated by like whatever eight to 10 hours each.

Brett Hornig (01:00:07.546)
Questionable. I don't know.

Leah (01:00:08.599)
haha

Finn (01:00:09.678)
But there was some like training theory-esque title for it. Cluster, it was cluster, it was like, it was cluster runs, cluster runs. Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:00:17.362)
Oh yes, you're right. Cluster runs. I haven't seen, I mean it is so hard to dive through everyone's Strava because and then I kind of went through so many and then I kind of concluded like you're right now everyone's running training really well. It's really going to come down to making you know who can make the least amount of mistakes but I didn't I don't think I saw any cluster runs.

Leah (01:00:35.628)
Yeah.

Leah (01:00:45.294)
Mm-mm.

Brett Hornig (01:00:46.614)
I wasn't looking too specifically though.

Brett Hornig (01:00:52.654)
Who's who's picking first? Oh.

Finn (01:00:52.772)
When we do, I'll go first and if I'm inspired enough, I'm gonna try to add in a jingle. Like if anyone here in the audience watches the ESPN NFL draft, whenever they make a pick, it has this jingle. It's like, do do. If you're an NFL fan, you'll get it. So I'll add a jingle to each of these picks, but I've got.

Leah (01:00:56.234)
It's going first.

Brett Hornig (01:01:02.746)
What?

Leah (01:01:15.615)
Oh god.

Brett Hornig (01:01:16.682)
I thought you were going to do like a like, the best part of waking up is Folger's in your cup.

Finn (01:01:21.236)
His folders in your cup. I actually have folders today. It was great. All right. So I actually went 60. I know we said we're going to go five deep. I went 60. I've got Heather Jackson winning the race, Rachel Drake in second, MK Sullivan in third, Riley Brady fourth, cat short fifth, Alison Baca six. The reason I went 60 is I think this is going to be a two part race. I think there's going to be a fierce battle at the front.

between Heather Jackson, Rachel Drake and MK Sullivan. But I think they're all gonna hold it together. And then I think there's gonna be a pack not far behind them, which is Riley Brady, Kat Shortenhouse and Baca. Because some of these people have tickets already, my golden ticket winners are Rachel Drake, MK Sullivan and Riley Brady, they're heading back to Western. So.

Leah (01:02:11.83)
Oh, we should add, golden tickets are rolling down to six at Black Canyon, according to Craig Hornley on Twitter. So in the past, golden tickets always roll down to five because they're giving three here. We will see rolling down to six, which is exciting. So that gives some opportunity for people turning them down or people already being into Western states.

Finn (01:02:17.166)
Yes.

Brett Hornig (01:02:18.842)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:02:34.414)
and Black Canyon is paying for your Western States entry fee to the golden ticket winners. So that's expensive. So here's a question. If you're in that spot and you turn down the golden ticket, you can't just accept a check for $500?

Finn (01:02:38.958)
Yeah.

Leah (01:02:41.142)
Which is, it's expensive. It's like, it's about $500.

Leah (01:02:55.024)
nice. Probably not.

Brett Hornig (01:02:56.95)
Like, what if you had a choice? Who would choose that? $500 or an entrant or the opportunity to run Western States. That's like classic Jared Hazen putting his belt buckle on eBay type scenario right there.

Finn (01:02:58.588)
I'm going to go ahead and turn it off.

Leah (01:02:59.824)
Awesome people.

Leah (01:03:07.286)
Yeah. Finn, I wanted to add, I don't know if you remember Bandera 2023, but Kat Short went out with Courtney DeWalter and stuck with Courtney DeWalter for a while. So I think Kat will be somebody we see in that lead pack early on. Like with Heather Jackson. Yeah.

Finn (01:03:25.604)
That's a great point. That's good memory. Great point. I think there are, I think this women's race, it could be a very aggressive year. And I like that dynamic. I like the fact that there could be people really laying it out on the line early, battling, not wanting to give up position. And yeah, just being a, I just, I love that. I love seeing that type of racing. And I guess my one prediction that I wanna hold to, and I'll be curious to see if it plays out, is I think that

of the people that I expect to go at hard, I don't expect as much attrition as we would normally see. Like one of the questions on Instagram, which could be funny to debate is, will this be the most DNF to race in the history of American ultra trail running because of how deep it is and how that environment can lead to questionable decision making? Maybe but of my picks, I see these, these people kind of holding it together.

Leah (01:04:20.601)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:04:21.322)
Yeah, I think I agree with you on that. And I feel like one of the most DNF races in American ultra running history is probably Barclay.

Finn (01:04:29.348)
Ha ha ha!

Brett Hornig (01:04:30.378)
or like Big's Backyard Ultra.

Leah (01:04:33.07)
That's a good point. Brett, let's hear your...

Brett Hornig (01:04:35.926)
Checkmate. All right.

Brett Hornig (01:04:41.374)
So I do not have the same picks as Finn, which I had a feeling, we've done prediction shows or preview shows in the past where a lot of our picks have been pretty similar and I was, I would have been pretty shocked if we had super similar picks across these ones. So I've got Rachel Drake taking the win and accepting a golden ticket, edging out Heather Jackson, who's already in Washington States.

I've got Alison Baca for third, taking a golden ticket. And then I've got Dark Horse Random Baller Marcy Kleimach hanging on for fourth, also taking that golden ticket. Fifth, I've got Riley Brady and then bonus sixth place, Shay Aquilano.

Leah (01:05:19.3)
Mm.

Leah (01:05:31.591)
Ours are similar, Brett.

Brett Hornig (01:05:32.242)
And I had, I had some like in Marcy's case for fourth place, I had about like four or five other women that were like in a similar, like you had like your Rachel to my check,

Brett Hornig (01:05:52.122)
who's going to be able to still go out pretty hard, but then have the legs less of decay. And it was, I mean, it was a biased coin flip for that spot. Cause then like you said, I think we're going to see a decent amount more aggression of racing in the front, but then just due to the level of talent in this field, we're just not going to see as much blowing up. So we'll see some micro fades, you know.

Finn (01:06:16.365)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:06:20.93)
I'm not saying like anyone that I left outside of my top six is like gonna DNF. I mean, they're probably right there in seventh. But I'm interested now to hear your picks, Leah.

Leah (01:06:33.278)
Okay, we're going, I'll go backwards. I got Marcy Klineback in fifth. Yeah, and then I got Riley Brady in fourth. I got Alison Baca in third. Rachel Drake in second. Heather Jackson in first. Heather and Rachel both breaking the course record. And I think they're gonna run like 10 minutes under the course record.

Finn (01:06:54.821)
Wow.

Leah (01:07:00.394)
And I think that's going to be a very close race between the two. I think Heather will have a bigger gap early on. I think Rachel's going to close that quite a bit.

Brett Hornig (01:07:03.822)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:07:10.615)
Yeah.

Finn (01:07:10.654)
to add to that because I like that. My entire top five goes sub nine. I'm not going to say

Leah (01:07:19.654)
I think they go sub-902.

Finn (01:07:22.074)
Mm.

Brett Hornig (01:07:24.558)
It was like a Price is Right type counter right there. You're like, oh yeah, well I bet the top five goes 7903.

Leah (01:07:26.947)
Hahaha!

Leah (01:07:33.562)
I'm sorry.

Brett Hornig (01:07:33.87)
Price is wrong.

Brett Hornig (01:07:41.07)
Okay, so it's Heather or Rachel. Interesting. I mean, yeah.

Leah (01:07:44.456)
Yeah.

So yeah, with those lineup, like we said, that means tickets would roll down to number four because we all had Heather Jackson in our top five there. So that would be cool. I would love to see Riley get another ticket to Western States. They missed out by one spot at Javelina behind Heather and Ragna DeBots. And then I know didn't quite have the Western States to have this summer. So would love to see them get back there.

Brett Hornig (01:07:52.597)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:08:06.344)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (01:08:10.7)
I think it's becoming increasingly easier to do with social media. But one thing that I start to factor in is what is the overall chemistry of these fields and how do each of the runners relate to each other? What's going on in their lives? Where are they at in their career? And how does all of that contribute to the dynamics of the race? And I just love the chemistry in this field. And I'm very excited to see, cause like Rachel Drake has talked in the past about um, how she collaborates with her competition to get the best out of herself.

And I think there's gonna be a lot of collaboration that goes on race day to help get those course records that you described. I think it's gonna be really fun.

Leah (01:08:47.062)
Yeah, that's what I saw a lot in that like third through fifth place last year was like, they were working together. Granted, they are racing each other, but like Meg Morgan, Shay, Anna, Eda, like they were kind of fighting each other but working with each other and it was really, really cool to see.

Brett Hornig (01:09:03.874)
That's what I love about golden ticket races is like, yes, winning the race is, you know, you're still the champion, you're first, but like, if you get that second or that third golden ticket, like you're kind of winning the race as well. So, um, and it, yeah. And who knows, maybe Rachel's going to be channeling some of this, you know, not being at the Olympic trials for the marathon. She's like, this is her Olympic trials. Like top three get to go to the Olympics, which is Western States.

Leah (01:09:17.675)
Totally.

Brett Hornig (01:09:32.691)
and she's got a legit chance to be on that team.

Finn (01:09:38.104)
All right, Men's Field, talk in depth, category, storylines, predictions. Brett, kick us off here. Where do you wanna start?

Brett Hornig (01:09:49.806)
There's a lot of returners, few more on the men's side than the women's side. So I'm just gonna roll through kind of the upper few returners. So we've got Cole Watson coming back, who was fourth. Noah Dussault, who was fifth. David Laney, who was seventh. Elliott Cardin, who was eighth. Stephen Kirsch, who was ninth. Matt Seidel, who was 10th. Dan Green, who was 12th. Ryan Miller, who was 13th.

Those are just all people who are just coming back, who wanna improve upon that. If you just take those people and they have the races that they had last year, there's not that much room to include new people. So it's, and it definitely, I mean, it won't play out like that, but yeah. And then there's also people who have had success in previous.

Leah (01:10:34.576)
Mm-mm.

Brett Hornig (01:10:48.374)
years of this race, you know, the big one is Hayden Hawks. He won Black Canyon in 2020. And yeah, if you haven't listened to the single track podcast Black Canyon interview with Hayden Hawks, give that a listen. That was great. I love how transparent Hayden is with his training and like his comeback from surgery and just being very vocal about how many stones he has turned over.

Leah (01:11:17.12)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:11:18.166)
He's like, oh yeah, I flew to the UK and was in an altitude chamber that had the heat cranked up and I ran virtually every section of the Western States course to figure out exactly how much fluid and carbohydrates I need on every section. And then I've been practicing that. I'm like, what? What? You had to fly to the UK to do that? But like, dang. Like that's...

Finn (01:11:43.64)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:11:46.95)
That is super impressive.

Brett Hornig (01:11:53.306)
How should I go through my categories? I have three, four, four categories. I don't think I'll go through every single name on all of them, but I had like, I had current heavy hitters. So those are, you know, those who have like recently banged out like one or more massively good races, actually more than one. Like I feel like you're a heavy hitter if you at least have two of them. Cause then we know you're

not just like a flash in the pan. So I had current heavy hitters I have was once a heavy hitter but might still have it in them.

Leah (01:12:30.3)
I like that.

Finn (01:12:31.096)
Yeah

Brett Hornig (01:12:33.694)
You know, like an example of that, like I've got David Laney, Tim Toleson, Mark Hammond, Jared Hazen, Stephen Kirsch. I have all of like was once a heavy hitter and might still have a heavy hitter type performance or year in them. Because they all have been like right at the top of the stage. You know, we're talking like podiums at Western states. Jared has what? The second fastest.

all-time time at Western States, multiple golden tickets. Mark Hammond's been on the podium multiple times. David and Tim have both podiumed at UTMB. Kirsch has had some pretty good international races. He's also had like a seventh at Western States. I mean, he was just ninth last year. I've got the little note next to him, home field advantage. He gets to spend some time out on the course.

And then I've got a list of our heavy hitter potentials who have had maybe one really good race or a couple close to really good races and are right on the bubble of making that jump. I've got Chris Myers, he had a great Bandera last year. He races a lot, just in that 50k to 100k type range and consistently is very good.

Leah (01:13:52.526)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:14:00.254)
recently moved to Boulder, in what appears to be a pretty strategic training environment change. So this will be the first race that he does, I think, since having moved full-time to Boulder. Mackay Clemens, he's been on the scene for a while, and I think is like, what, like, Coconino cowboy adjacent? Like, he's rolled with the crew from time to time?

I don't know, I kind of like how people throw like Tupac is like a Bay Area type rapper because he did roll with them for a little bit. Anyways, he just crushed the San Diego 100 last year, which was probably a heavy hitter type performance, but then it's like, do that with other people around you now. A couple other names, like Rod Farward, Adam Mary, Ryan Miller.

Finn (01:14:52.154)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:14:58.918)
Um, do we know if Rajpal Paneu is racing?

Finn (01:15:02.04)
He's not, he's focusing on the 100 mile jackpot race, I think.

Leah (01:15:06.158)
That's cool.

Brett Hornig (01:15:06.238)
Okay, because I saw that he was signed up for both, but a lot of his Strava seemed very narrowed in on jackpot 100.

Finn (01:15:16.336)
So I tried to get him for an interview and he said he's focusing on the 100 mile.

Brett Hornig (01:15:21.686)
Okay, okay, we'll cross him off the list.

Brett Hornig (01:15:28.922)
Canyon Woodward, Finn's favorite runner. He was third at Bandera last year, which was kind of the eye-opener race for me for him, but he's had some solid UTMBs. He was like 27th male last year at UTMB. I think the year before that, he was in the 40s, which like...

Finn (01:15:30.457)
Yes, we can.

Leah (01:15:34.478)
Thank you.

Leah (01:15:47.914)
Yeah, he has.

Finn (01:15:48.112)
solid.

Brett Hornig (01:15:57.354)
If you're in the 40s at YouTube, that's a good race. I'm curious to see, again, his trainings look good. Then another person who I feel like has been really knocking on the door and is like, we've said this so many times, they're like one race away from really busting out is Matt Seidel. Another pretty prolific racer, does a lot of cool running over in the Bay Area, but was 10th at Black Canyon last year.

Leah (01:16:15.039)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:16:27.498)
went for recently went for the trials qualifier at CIM and missed it but not by too much right

Leah (01:16:36.206)
No, not by too much. I just feel like Matt is one of those runners who just has all the potential in the world. And like, we're just waiting for him to have that one race that just showcases it all. And I'm so excited.

Brett Hornig (01:16:48.01)
And I wouldn't be surprised if like once he has that race once, he'll be able to do it every time.

Leah (01:16:52.258)
this keeps going. Yes, exactly.

Brett Hornig (01:16:56.246)
And then the last one I've got, well the last two, Dan Green, who was 12th at Black Canyon last year, but then fourth at Javelina. And I feel like that was a big jump for him. So like.

Leah (01:17:08.706)
huge jump and he looked like he was going for it and looked consistently good all day long and I think it wasn't that he really like slowed down that much. It's just everybody attacked that last like 10 miles a little bit more than he was able to.

Brett Hornig (01:17:25.118)
Yeah, absolutely. And then Noah Dussault, who was fifth at the race last year, is all like right merging into that heavy hitter type category. So I'm really curious to see from this list, like who makes that jump. And then the last category I had was like, I guess actually, I wrote it as like dark horses or dudes with the fitness to be in the top 10.

But now that I'm looking at the names, they're actually just really fast people, who I guess then have the potential to be in the top 10. But an exciting name on the list is Hans Troyer, who just smashed Bandera last month. He ran 7.45 and that was pretty solo. Who knows how much time he takes off if that was still a golden ticket race.

But he's coming back to Black Canyon. The biggest question mark there that we were talking about is like, is this too soon? I mean, I don't think we've ever seen someone win Bandera and then come and just run Black Canyon. No one's ever needed to, but we've seen a ton of people try the Black Canyon or the Bandera Black Canyon double, and it's hard. It's a short turnaround. So curious to see Hans Schreuer. And then Nate Jukes, who,

Leah (01:18:43.831)
Thank you.

Brett Hornig (01:18:52.142)
trains a lot with Hayden Hawks. He's like, you know, Hayden in your pre race interview, Finn, you know, Hayden said like, look out for Nate, you know, Nate's a beast. Nate is a 1350 5k guy. Like he was teammates with Hayden and Cam Levens at Southern Utah University and like Nate ran 1350 for the 5k and 2840 for 10k.

Finn (01:19:10.031)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:19:20.094)
and is just now realizing that he actually loves trail running. So, as we've historically seen, when you're that good and you learn that you love trail running, oftentimes you have success at trail running. So, another person...

Leah (01:19:38.098)
And he's got like four or five kids, I think.

Brett Hornig (01:19:41.674)
Yeah, his Strava like bio says 5.5 kids.

Leah (01:19:46.238)
Oh, that's... wow.

Finn (01:19:47.676)
Huh.

Brett Hornig (01:19:48.738)
So I don't know what the point five means, maybe like a baby.

Leah (01:19:52.446)
Yeah, on the way maybe.

Brett Hornig (01:19:54.366)
Yeah, so 5.5 kids. And then the other speedster that, I'm sure we're all very curious about is Andrew Bumbalow, formerly of the Oregon Track Club and Bowerman Track Club. And he missed making the Olympic team in the 5K in 2012 by one spot.

13, he eats 13 55 K's for breakfast. His PR is 1312. Which like now we're getting into world class type territory. I mean, I think and towards the end of his track career, he dabbled in the marathon and in 2019 ran to 10 at Chicago, which the only person to have started Black Canyon that's run faster than that, which it's amazing that there's actually been someone to run faster and that was Reed Coolset, who has run a faster marathon. But

Finn (01:20:45.487)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:20:49.11)
Word on the street is Bumby's pretty fit and you know, he did do a little 20 mile tune-up race in Bend last winter and oh where's that note? It's on one of my six pages.

Leah (01:21:04.43)
I'm sorry.

Finn (01:21:06.148)
Control F, Control F.

Brett Hornig (01:21:06.426)
I think it was, I know, he beat, I think it was Noah do so. By like.

Leah (01:21:13.545)
It was. It was. You said that. To me, at least.

Brett Hornig (01:21:16.682)
Yeah, was that right? Okay. Yeah. By like five minutes there. I mean, I know that's only a 20 mile race, but you know, if Bumby can handle the downhill of the first half, I mean, he's gonna be he's gonna be dangerous for sure. Last speedster is Craig Hunt, who I don't you know, he ran the Carbon X project like the 100k but I don't know if he's done like a trail 100k.

Leah (01:21:45.526)
He was in Black Canyon a couple years ago. Remember he was leading the race through mile 50?

Brett Hornig (01:21:46.367)
Um, oh, yeah.

Finn (01:21:51.162)
Yep.

Brett Hornig (01:21:51.638)
Yeah, you're right. I have a bullet that says DNF Black Canyon 100k 2021.

Finn (01:21:55.249)
And the last guy to hang with Jim Walmsley during his 100k world record attempt. He was the last man standing.

Brett Hornig (01:22:00.286)
Oh, was he the last one of the group? Okay. And he won way too cool last year. He has a 2.15 marathon PR, so again, speedy. But I don't think that's gonna be the only thing that helps win the race. It helps to have that. But I have a feeling that those who have a little bit more.

like elite trail racing experience are going to be the ones to emerge.

What do y'all think? Any names that I missed?

Leah (01:22:36.422)
I like the strike hunt thought here because I actually think he had a really great early 2023 where he was like lining up 50k after 50k trail marathon almost every other weekend and performing extremely well at them. And then yeah, just thinking back to his Black Canyon 20, maybe 21 or whatever the year that was, I think he was leading through 50 miles and then left the aid station still in the lead. But then we saw him walking back.

Brett Hornig (01:22:47.179)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (01:23:03.458)
like soon after, and that's when like that race broke apart when that was like Tyler and Senseman. So I do feel like he has really significant course knowledge here. And the fact that he was able to do that off of very little trail experience then, I think speaks a lot to what he can do now. But I wasn't necessarily thinking about Craig Hunt in my top five, but now I might've just convinced myself.

Brett Hornig (01:23:20.104)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:23:25.458)
I know that I had those exact same thoughts go through my head now. As you're like, now that I think about it, I'm like, well, that's not how I wrote my top five.

Leah (01:23:33.643)
You did forget, but he's also kind of, he's not in like the ball P list on ultrasound. If you got to scroll down to the people with all out, ultra sign up results, um, P can you from, um, I believe China, um, correct me if I'm wrong. He's won the Hong Kong a hundred K in 2020 also got second place very recently at the Hong Kong hundred K as well. Um, I believe this is his first time racing in the United States.

Finn (01:23:47.533)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (01:23:58.998)
So curious to see A, how the recovery after Hong Kong went, but then B also how training on running on this terrain will feel for him.

Brett Hornig (01:24:08.918)
Yeah. Um, I guess one of the nice things about, well, actually, no, he just raced in Hong Kong. Where does he train? Where does he live?

Leah (01:24:18.53)
positive.

Brett Hornig (01:24:18.762)
Okay, I was just assuming Hong Kong, but that's probably not the case. I actually didn't I didn't name my current heavy hitters list. I realize I just omitted like five massive names. Well, I did I did mention like current heavy hitters like Hayden Hawks. You know, even though he didn't you know, race for most of 2023, I still put him in that current heavy hitter.

Finn (01:24:32.254)
Keep the moment in.

Brett Hornig (01:24:47.746)
uh, list, uh, John Ray, Johnny Ray, uh, course record at Havalina in October, fourth at CCC. That's one of the nastiest doubles, uh, of all time. It's just that CCC Havalina stack. Um, you know, 14th at Western States and you know, clearly there's a lot of motivation to get back because I feel like if you look at

Leah (01:25:00.59)
Thanks for watching!

Brett Hornig (01:25:14.918)
Johnny Ray's like last two years of racing, Western states have been the only misses. And, you know, when you're breaking, you know, when you're running fourth at CCC, breaking the course record at Javelina, like you are absolutely, you absolutely deserve to be in the like podium talk for Western states. So, you know, I kind of, I understand, like he has a, you know, a spot in Western states already, but

Leah (01:25:20.075)
video.

Brett Hornig (01:25:42.526)
I totally understand just lining up and getting this kind of, you know, like a dress rehearsal for this level of competition before Western States. You know, another opportunity to practice some like cluster runs or similar sort of things. He did do some like pretty long race simulation runs where it was like, you know, 30 or 40 miles at 730, 100 K pace and was like, oh yeah, that felt pretty good.

Leah (01:26:09.931)
Mm.

Finn (01:26:10.78)
We should get, because his coach is Adam St. Pierre, we should get his coach on the show before Western States to talk about how he trained John for Western. If John gets into Western, or sorry, he's in Western, so we'll talk about his build-up. He's already in, he's already in. Just some of that.

Brett Hornig (01:26:21.57)
He's already in Western, yeah.

Leah (01:26:24.638)
Yeah, so he's got nothing to lose also with this race, which I think, I mean, that can go both ways. It's like extremely scary because it's like, what will he do? But then also from like a mental standpoint, if like something's feeling off, you might be thinking like, eh, why risk it? So I'm not sure how he would, I feel like he's gonna go for it, but we'll see.

Brett Hornig (01:26:24.886)
Yeah, and like, we'll be...

Brett Hornig (01:26:29.156)
Mm-hmm.

Brett Hornig (01:26:42.778)
True, true.

Yeah, you do get to know pressure go for it, which there's three people, you know, in this heavy hitters list that get to do that. And the other one is Cole Watson, who is the, I guess he's the highest returner from last year. Right. Yeah. Getting fourth. First, it the Canyon's hundred K and then ninth, the Western States. So he already has his in at Western States. And, you know, we're just coming back to black Canyon to race and, you know, compete.

Leah (01:27:00.854)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:27:17.398)
And then the other person's Ryan Montgomery who had an amazing Havalina this past October as well and was seventh at Western States last year. So again, we're just like we're just racing The last heavy hitter that I have that is trying to gain entry into Western States is Eric La Puma Who yeah the Puma I believe that's what it translates to

Finn (01:27:37.521)
Puma.

Finn (01:27:43.58)
Thanks for watching!

Brett Hornig (01:27:46.81)
I mean, when you're top 10 at the last two world championships, you've got to have a little bit of clutch factor in you. So, you know, probably looking to redeem himself from a DNF in 2022. You know, he's got he's got a smart coach. He's coached by Corrine Malcolm.

Leah (01:28:02.626)
Yeah.

Leah (01:28:07.722)
I do think just from observing Eric's training on Strava, he has to win the most miserable training award. His win for Vermont has seemed pretty heinous. So I feel like whatever weather gets thrown at Black Canyon, Eric is ready for it. He is also, you guys can fact check me on this because I'm just probably pulling this out of my ass, but he's the only person in the field who has been on both the roads, worlds team and mountain trail team. So he ran on

Finn (01:28:14.701)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:28:15.459)
Oh gosh.

Leah (01:28:36.886)
The USA 100 K roads team, like two years ago, and then also has been on two mountain trail teams now.

Finn (01:28:43.398)
Is there any chance, and I don't know this, but did Craig Hunt do that as well? Because I know that he got second at Formidable. Okay. I'm not, and I'm not sure, but that's still, that's still.

Leah (01:28:48.47)
Well, well, probably. I think you're probably right. I'm pretty sure he was on the Rhodes 50K team and then the short course. Yeah, Eric is the highest performing person who has done both.

Finn (01:28:59.312)
Still rare air, it's still off.

Finn (01:29:05.38)
The only thing I worry about with Eric, and this was impressed upon me in the Hayden conversation is how important as the sport professionalizes specificity becomes in your training and like, you know, Hayden making all these efforts to get down to St. George from Cedar city, because St. George is like, it replicates the black Canyon course. Well, a lot of people that do well at this race, it's because they have home field advantage or they do their training camps down here. Like you said, when's the award for worst training location is

Brett Hornig (01:29:05.9)
Yep.

Finn (01:29:35.324)
probably finding it very difficult to mimic what he needs to do from a core specific. I just worry about that because he has all the talent in the world. He's clutch. He's amazing. He's world class, but his environment.

Leah (01:29:35.374)
I wanna think first.

Leah (01:29:44.594)
Yeah. I do think he's just been extremely versatile though. I think that'll be helpful. And it's, yeah, I don't know. I feel like he can do it all, but I understand, yeah, that concern as well. I will say back to like your St. George perspective there, I did a training run recently in St. George and it was supposed to be a group run with, yeah, Caleb and like Hayden Hawks and Nate Jukes, Nate Jukes, right?

Brett Hornig (01:29:46.659)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (01:30:10.075)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:30:13.07)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (01:30:13.59)
Well, it was be like a easy group run pace. And guys, I kid you not within 45 seconds of starting this run, this was not easy group run pace. And I got dropped so hard. It was about probably two minutes in. I was like, okay, you guys can go. Um, but yeah, I think they are both extremely fit and then going to be in very, a good place for this race. But the St. George terrain, the whole time I was doing this run, I was like, this is perfect black Canyon training. It's.

like identical, so I do think that specificity is helpful. However, I think Eric LaPuma will farewell on it regardless.

Finn (01:30:51.456)
I'll add a couple notes before we get into pics. The first thing, I don't know how this started, but both Dan Green and Mackay Clemens have two of the largest social media fan bases I've ever encountered. Our DMs got flooded today with, put some respect on Mackay Clemens' name posts, and then Dan Green is super fit posts, watch out. So these people, for whatever reason, have amassed.

Leah (01:31:15.524)
Oh nice.

Finn (01:31:17.836)
you know, significant followings on social. They wanted to let Singletrack know that they're fit and ready to go. So there's that. Second thing, we got some interesting fan mail. The first one was, quote, conspiracy. Eric Senceman's retirement was a ruse. He will enter last minute and get a golden ticket to Western states.

Leah (01:31:30.566)
Yeah.

Leah (01:31:38.454)
That'd be awesome.

Brett Hornig (01:31:40.29)
That would be amazing. And also, the only race where that can happen is Black Canyon because Eric Sensen's like, everything he touches turns to gold at Black Canyon 100K. Yeah, he is Mr. Black Canyon.

Finn (01:31:53.248)
He's Mr. Black, can't he? Another one was, quote, two words, Hans Troyer. So I mentioned him earlier. But just a couple comments from me. You know, I did see earlier this year on social, you know, Ryan Montgomery, you know, in public said I want to take a big step forward this year. Like I've had a lot of success in this sport the last year or two.

Leah (01:32:01.42)
I'm sorry.

Finn (01:32:20.144)
bigger leap in the sport in terms of stature and you know, how I kind of size up among the best. This is a great opportunity. I think he's been ascendant. He's an extremely hard worker and he has proven, he proved to me last year that not only can he perform well, but he can resurrect when the going gets tough. Like Brett, I still can't get that image out of my mind from Michigan Bluff last year when I thought he was gonna DNF and he just still came back. So Ryan is impressive and

Brett Hornig (01:32:44.186)
Oh yeah.

Finn (01:32:48.984)
I'm very excited to see what he does. The second thing I'll say is, and I'm not the right person to do it, I don't have the credibility, but I believe that John Ray is a superstar. And somebody with credibility has to go and anoint him a superstar because I think he has proved that he is. And I worry that he is forever gonna be an unanointed superstar in our sport. And he's just gonna kind of be on start lines and people are gonna be like, yeah, he's like pretty solid. No, he's a superstar.

Brett Hornig (01:33:17.378)
What does this mean? Like someone has to like knight him?

Finn (01:33:21.788)
I don't know, I feel like there's always been a moment in the sport where like, you know, when wrongfully... Sorry?

Brett Hornig (01:33:27.358)
Why can't it be you? You can be the one to anoint him.

Finn (01:33:30.058)
I'm just a guy. I'm just a fan. I'm just a guy. Like we need like a pro. We need like, you know, we need a pro to do it. We need a Lio.

Brett Hornig (01:33:33.377)
I don't.

Dude, if I'm John Rey and I'm listening to this, I'm like, dude, I don't want Finn to be applying any anointment to me anywhere.

Finn (01:33:41.7)
That's what I'm saying. That's why I shouldn't do it.

Brett Hornig (01:33:46.395)
I don't even know what that means.

Finn (01:33:48.412)
but I think John's a stud and yeah. So, should we go to picks?

Leah (01:33:56.27)
Let's do it.

Brett Hornig (01:33:57.806)
Alright.

Finn (01:33:57.944)
Do do doon doon. All right, Brett, go ahead.

Brett Hornig (01:34:02.57)
Okay, how many did I write down? One, two, three, four, five, six, I wrote seven. Because I wrote like a few, and then I was just like, okay, I'm gonna write all the names that I think can be in the top five, and then I'll keep shuffling them around. And then I just didn't delete a few, but anyways, the winner, to go along with like Finn's jingle, the winner of the 2024.

Leah (01:34:10.131)
Why?

Leah (01:34:19.251)
That's nice, okay.

Brett Hornig (01:34:31.086)
Black Canyon 100k will be Cole Watson. And again, unbiased coin flip. But also, he had a garbage middle 10 miles from just after Black Canyon City to before Table Mesa. He was throwing up, walk jogging, the chase pack caught up to him. He was telling me later, he was like, dude, Laney.

Leah (01:34:35.81)
Right?

Brett Hornig (01:34:59.006)
saved my race, Lainey caught up to me and was like, no, you got to start running with me. And like, he just kind of coached him back into it. And then all of a sudden, Cole came back to life and he ran one of the fastest like last splits from table Mesa to the finish, still broke eight hours. Like eight hours with sub eight was like a mythical time. Only Sage Canada had really ever done that. I guess Hayden in 2020. Exactly. So it's like for Cole to have such a long stretch of like

Finn (01:35:18.922)
And on the 38th mile he rose again.

Brett Hornig (01:35:28.898)
bad and still run under eight hours and then to like learn from that and flip it around at canyons. You know, I think there's going to be a lot of things in Cole's head about like, okay, this is what I can do right because I did it last year. This is what I can fix. And I think he's learned a lot about just believing his abilities to close a race hard because he had always been like, you know,

the bridesmaid of good and golden tickets. And like he would always make his move way too early because he wasn't patient enough, but I think he's finally learning some of that patience. And that's gonna be one of those things where, though, like we said earlier, the winner of the race is just getting decided later and later and you gotta be patient. You can't think you're gonna drop people at mile 30 or even 35. So, Cole Watson with the win.

Leah (01:36:18.142)
Nice.

Brett Hornig (01:36:18.462)
And it's going to, this is going to be close. This is like a blanket finish. Like we might literally be kicking it in the last mile. I've got Johnny Ray in second, which is interesting because both of them are in Western States, you know. No golden tickets have been handed out yet. Rounding out the podium, I've got Hayden Hawks, which, you know, there's people right now like screaming at trees and stuff as they're running, listening to this being like,

Winning and that's just because this is his first race back coming off surgery. It's just hard as much as you want to do that. It's just hard to get the body to cooperate. I think it's going to cooperate good enough to get a golden ticket, but winning the race, I'm not sure. Fourth place, Eric Lapuma. The Puma is going to defy the odds of course specificity because he's good at running. Oh, my computer went asleep. And then rounding out.

The top five, I've got Mackay Clemens in fifth, and then David Laney close sixth.

Leah (01:37:20.62)
Okay.

Leah (01:37:26.391)
I like them.

Finn (01:37:26.96)
David Laney in six, nice.

Brett Hornig (01:37:29.546)
Yeah, I mean, he got, what did he get, seventh last year? And he's tough, his training's been pretty good and he also had a five mile section that was trash where he messed up his calories and he had zero calories from miles 45 to 50 and just bonked so bad and then came back to life and closed super hard. So it's like, okay, well clearly you can fix that from one year to the next. So that's gotta be a couple minutes right there, which...

Leah (01:37:29.582)
Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

Finn (01:37:32.524)
Yeah, he's a tough runner too.

Brett Hornig (01:37:59.05)
And I think in this race, a couple of minutes will mean multiple places.

Leah (01:38:02.262)
Wait, does that mean you don't have John Ray in your top five? Oh, I wasn't listening. Turned out. I don't have John Ray in my top five. And so now I'm just feeling all problematic over here.

Brett Hornig (01:38:05.706)
No item in second.

Finn (01:38:09.2)
Ha ha.

Finn (01:38:12.688)
Wow.

Brett Hornig (01:38:14.486)
Oh, so yay, we're finally disagreeing on something. All right, I gotta hear Leo's picks then.

Leah (01:38:18.46)
Thank you.

Finn (01:38:20.941)
What you got, Leah? What you got?

Leah (01:38:22.318)
Okay, I'm gonna start from, well, I did six. And yeah, somehow John Wright still didn't make mine, so maybe I'll regret my decisions. Number six, Dan Green. I liked how he ran Javelina. I feel like he really put himself out there and had a lot of confidence. So we'll see how that plays out at Black Canyon if he runs similarly. And I think Caleb Bowen's been messaging you, Finn, I don't know, on some social media platforms. I know he trains with him and says he's even fitter coming into Black Canyon.

than he was Havelina, so I think that should be a recipe for success. I've got Eric Lapuma in fifth. We didn't talk much about Rod. I have Rod in fourth. And I feel like this is an unpopular opinion because I feel like both of you guys don't really have him in your top five. I was looking at Hayden Hawke's training today when I was going through our people and I was like, dang, he's been putting in like these 20-hour weeks with...

Brett Hornig (01:39:03.29)
Okay.

Leah (01:39:16.694)
biking and running and he seems very confident. I was like, he's gotta be putting in some of the most volume of anybody. And then I looked at Rod on Strava on my browser, which gives you like cumulative training of all mediums. And Rod's been doing like 24 hours a week of training between skiing, running, biking. And I feel like, I mean, I've been following Rod for a while, I feel like this is his most like specific training he's ever done and like almost just like focused training he's ever done.

And I want to remind our listeners that like, he is extremely fast and at Canyon's 50 K this year, he was coming back from injury and was right behind Jeshuron and Hayden in this 50 K before getting lost a mile 27. Um, so he was in the mix for podium spot with two of the guys that we consider probably are some of the fastest 50 K runners in the States. So I think that combo of Rod's training, his focus, his desire to get back to Western States, I think we'll see him.

very much in the mix and I haven't been fourth. Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:40:18.394)
It's a good pick.

Finn (01:40:19.256)
He took fifth in 2019. It was a different era, but he took fifth. It was impressive.

Leah (01:40:23.278)
Yeah, I mean, yeah, he's, he can put it together too. And I love how he races, just like super focused. And I feel like he's been really focusing on putting all the little pieces together the last year with like nutrition, hydration, electrolytes, things like that. So I think we'll see a great race out of him.

Brett Hornig (01:40:40.046)
He's just gotta not get rabdo.

Leah (01:40:42.55)
that too, he'll be good. I've got cool Watson in there. And my only comments that I have in here is the way he ran last year was so gutsy, I loved it. So I wanna see Cole do that again, because I just feel like, yeah, Brett, like you mentioned, like he was kind of dead for a little bit of a second there. And I saw him when I was on the live stream, when he came into, I think it was Black Canyon City. It was horrible. Yeah, and he looked really hot.

Brett Hornig (01:40:46.142)
Yeah, drink your fluids.

Brett Hornig (01:40:53.658)
Hehehe

Brett Hornig (01:41:02.18)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:41:07.854)
He looks horrible there.

Leah (01:41:11.614)
and took some time to cool down. And I was like, his day is over. But if you go back and watch finish, the finishing drone shots of Cole, it was wild. He was sprinting so fast. So I think he can turn it around, even if he is having a rough day out there. He took it out hot last year and like it pretty much stuck. So I think he'll do that again. Second place, I feel like the people are saying it. So I got to listen. I'm going with Mackay Clemens. He's got it.

His JFK was impressive too. I don't know if you guys hit on that. He ran a 5.32 there. I think his San Diego didn't get the attention. It really deserved. I'm assuming, I know that's probably a slightly different course than I think when Carl Meltzer ran the course record there. So I think that would stand probably as a course record these days. I think he's gonna do something special and I feel like he's kind of this underdog of sorts coming into the race. So hopefully I can see that represented in my finishing picks.

Brett Hornig (01:41:43.059)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (01:42:04.848)
Mm.

Leah (01:42:08.722)
And then I got Hayden Hawks. I just feel like he's seeming very confident. His training's been great. He dropped me so hard. So, he's just... I feel like he's gonna do really well. I feel like normally, Brett, I'd be feeling like similarly to your picks, but I don't know. There's something about his training, his focus and his confidence coming into this that I feel like he is kinda hard to bet against for this one.

Brett Hornig (01:42:33.346)
I'm glad that we finally have some different picks. Like that's a good thing. That's a good thing. And it's a good thing as long as I'm right.

Leah (01:42:36.956)
Yeah, same. Yeah. Good for the sport.

Leah (01:42:41.679)
Yeah, okay.

Finn (01:42:44.807)
All right.

Brett Hornig (01:42:45.258)
Also, one thing about Makai that I forgot to say, he is in for the Angelus Crest 100 mile this year. Which like, that's just, that's kind of cool to have.

Leah (01:42:53.858)
I saw that, yeah. I guess one thing that is kind of elusive to me is his training looks great and everything. He hasn't posted anything yet this week, so. Selfie. Yes. No. Yeah, true, it's Thursday though. Yeah, maybe he's just going dark.

Brett Hornig (01:43:06.746)
Hmm

Finn (01:43:08.749)
interesting.

Brett Hornig (01:43:09.334)
Maybe he just hasn't synced, he's off the grid, he hasn't synced his watch.

Finn (01:43:13.276)
Thanks for watching!

Brett Hornig (01:43:19.063)
Yeah.

Finn (01:43:20.792)
I got to set some ambiance for my picks. I got to set the scene here. So I believe that maybe my, the most bold pick I have for this episode is that the entire men's top 10 is going under eight hours. Weather dependent, like assuming we're not seeing like hurricane like conditions out there, I've got the whole entire top 10 going under eight hours.

I believe that it's also going to be an extremely tight race. I think you're going to, we're going to see some amazing drone shots of final mile chases, you know, people grappling for the second spot, third spot, the wind, et cetera, I think it's going to be theatrical. And I also believe that people are getting pushed limit. We're gonna see people blowing chunks at the finish line. It's going to be, it's going to be like. Oh, I think it's going to be like, there's going to be, it's just going to be glorious. With all of that said.

Brett Hornig (01:43:43.147)
Well.

Brett Hornig (01:44:03.422)
all over the studio.

Leah (01:44:04.726)
Yeah, all over Brett.

Brett Hornig (01:44:11.162)
Just throw up ASMR. Ha ha ha.

Leah (01:44:13.902)
That would be glorious.

Finn (01:44:15.677)
But you're going to see like, I'm talking like Jeff Browning versus Kyle P. Atari chase downs on the track, Brittany Peterson versus Claire, like that kind of theatrics is going to be cool. That's my prediction. I want to I'm going to wish that in new existence. I got Cole Watson taking the win. I think Cole Watson is prime time. Cole Watson is prime time in the same way that I want to see the elevation of John Ray, I want to see the continued elevation of Cole Watson.

one of the most talented, the second most pure talented runner in this race besides Andrew Bumbela. Would you agree, Brett?

Brett Hornig (01:44:48.342)
I mean, it's like the, what is it? Like Hayden, Nate Jukes, Cole Watson, Bumbley, like all had those, they all got speedy, speedy times.

Finn (01:44:53.146)
Yeah.

Finn (01:44:56.368)
Yeah.

Finn (01:45:01.872)
Calls a beast.

Leah (01:45:02.095)
Um, is cool. It's sponsored right now.

Brett Hornig (01:45:05.778)
as a free agent right now.

Leah (01:45:08.74)
That's cool.

Brett Hornig (01:45:08.974)
So I don't know, maybe some of that Anthony Castellus unsponsored magical dust will roll off onto coal a little bit.

Finn (01:45:20.112)
Is he gonna wear like a Rogue Valley Ranchero shirt?

Brett Hornig (01:45:24.114)
I wish those existed. I don't know what he's gonna wear. Hopefully something awesome.

Finn (01:45:25.776)
Thank you.

Leah (01:45:29.902)
chosen to our merit.

Finn (01:45:31.032)
I've got Hayden Hawks in second, I've got John Ray in third, Mackay Clemens in four, Ryan Montgomery in five, and I've got Eric Lapuma in six. So we are gonna see the ticket go all the way down to the sixth spot where Eric Lapuma is. And yeah, Hayden Hawks, Mackay Clemens, and Puma are all heading to Western states. Cole's already in, John's already in, Ryan's already in. I'm gonna add one more person because you mentioned Rod earlier. That was an amazing, that was an awesome mention.

Brett Hornig (01:45:44.953)
Hmm.

Finn (01:45:57.688)
I've got Joey DeFeo in seventh. It means nothing in terms of golden tickets, but Joey DeFeo, I think, has a coming out party, um, of high performance here at Black Canyon. He's had some really solid training and flag, uh, knows the course well. And a you guy, uh, loves the trails, loves the game. And, uh, he's kind of my, uh, out of left field pick.

Brett Hornig (01:46:20.954)
Is he like next generation cowboy?

Finn (01:46:24.588)
Maybe I think he's also cowboy adjacent. I think him and Mackay are kind of like cowboy adjacent. I think, you know, I mean, Joey paste senseman at Coco Dona 250, which is kind of cool. Like he's, he's in, he's in with the crowd. And I'm like, yeah, next time, next time cowboy. Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:46:35.318)
Okay, yeah, so he's in the next gen, next gen cowboy. Are we on course record watch for the men's race?

Leah (01:46:45.086)
I think so. I think, um, weather dependent, I think. I think Anthony and Tom pushed each other to a great time last year. I think the women's course record definitely has a little time to move down. Like normally, when I look at course records, I think men and women should be roughly a minute per mile apart from each other. I think right now, the men and women's for this race is like maybe 75 minutes apart from each other or something.

Finn (01:46:46.16)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:46:47.278)
Do you think it'll happen?

Leah (01:47:14.558)
I think the men's can go down a little bit, but probably not by much this year, if any.

Brett Hornig (01:47:21.578)
Yeah, I can see sub 740, but like, I mean, prior to Anthony, the course record was 752 by Sage candidate in 2016. So it had been like seven years before someone ran faster than Anthony just absolutely squashed it by and beat the eventual Western States champion. So like, you know, I think if you're in that

Leah (01:47:24.92)
Yeah.

Leah (01:47:47.618)
Yeah.

Brett Hornig (01:47:50.926)
within shouting distance at that time, you're immediately looking, I got to be winning Western states.

Finn (01:47:59.452)
Well guys, this has been an awesome episode for those that are listening, those that are watching. Let us know what you think. Give us your picks, give us your comments, give us your questions. Hit us up on social at runs, single track, I'll post Brett and Leah's social handles in the show notes as well. And yeah, we're all stoked about Black Canyon. Brett, any final thoughts from you before we go?

Brett Hornig (01:48:19.626)
Yeah, I mean, if you have like, you know, any hot takes, comments, questions, concerns, just send them to the Run Single Track Instagram page instead of mine or Leah's.

Leah (01:48:29.859)
I'm gonna go.

Just send all the criticisms Finns way.

Finn (01:48:33.206)
Hahaha

Brett Hornig (01:48:36.365)
Yeah.

Finn (01:48:38.356)
What you got Leah? Any final words?

Leah (01:48:40.63)
Oh, not really. I just think this is going to be a really exciting year. I think if you're running this race, reach out to us, tell us what you'll be wearing so we can give you the appropriate shout out on the live stream. Really hard to identify faces when sprinting by us extremely fast out there. I know there's a lot of names we did not mention today. I think it just speaks to the depth of this race this year. And like there's 30 women, there's, you know, 30 plus men who are.

Brett Hornig (01:48:53.548)
Mm-hmm.

Leah (01:49:09.17)
in the battle for these golden tickets and these podium spots. So yeah, just know that there's a lot of you guys out there, and I'm sure it's going to be fire on race day.