Spartathlon 2015; Friday 25th-Saturday26th September

menoscemo

Last year's thread provided a lot of entertainment and this year's should do so even more.
A lot of Irish (and adopted Irish) have travelled over to the race this year, including our very own Ultraman1 and everyone's favourite moderator TFBubendorfer. Also competing are semi regular boards posters Brian Ankers and Don Hannon as well as the evergreen Eddie Gallen and Irish Ultra regular and adopted Limerick man Thomas Kilmas.

The race starts tomorrow at 5am and the lads have 36 hours to make the 246km journey From Athens to the feet of the statue of Leonidas in Sparta.

The participant list is here
Live tracking will be available here

Best of luck lads!

Ososlo

Best of luck to the Boardsies running!

Enduro

Great to see so many Irish racing this. Best of luck to all!

DogSlySmile

Not too many big ultra names (that I recognize, anyway) running this year. Mike Wardian is the standout, he won a 100 mile race just last month and was just outside the Western States 100 miler top 20 in June.

Come on you boys in green

Cabaal

Any chance Dean Karnazes is running again this year?
I just want to see people beat him

Enduro

DogSlySmile wrote: »

Not too many big ultra names (that I recognize, anyway) running this year. Mike Wardian is the standout, he won a 100 mile race just last month and was just outside the Western States 100 miler top 20 in June.

Come on you boys in green

Goin through the list and picking out the international level runners I recognise:

Eddie Gallen

Anderson Mimi 53 United Kingdom
Wardian Michael 41 United States
Bubendorfer Thomas 45 Austria
Law Sharon 40 United Kingdom
Robbins Pat 43 United Kingdom
Cudin Ivan 40 Italy
Chaigne Olivier 35 France
Uzik Jan 40 Slovakia
Falbo Traci 44 United States
Barnes Pablo 39 Italy
Reus Florian 31 Germany
Martin-Consani Debbie 40 United Kingdom

That's plenty of ultra talent there! A long list of Japanese runners too, no doubt with one or two big guns in there. I'd agree with Mike Wardian looking like a contender. The world 24 hour champion has to have a little chance too, along with the defending spartathlon champion But its not a straightforward race, so anything can happen.

menoscemo

Cabaal wrote: »

Any chance Dean Karnazes is running again this year?
I just want to see people beat him

Nah, he backed out after finishing 148th last year. It doesn't do his self proclaimed status as the world's fittest man any good to finish 12 hours behind the winner

Here's a trailer to a film about last years race featuring UM1 at 3:25. https://vimeo.com/130293703

I think last year featured a lot more finishers than normal but it looks like it is very hot in Greece at the moment so there might be less this year...

menoscemo

There's a few sneaky hills in this one

TFBubendorfer

DogSlySmile wrote: »

Not too many big ultra names (that I recognize, anyway) running this year. Mike Wardian is the standout, he won a 100 mile race just last month and was just outside the Western States 100 miler top 20 in June.

Come on you boys in green

F***, I can't sleep!

Both reigning 24 hrs world champions are here, as well as last year's winners. Two or three other contenders; Mike Wardian is actually an outside bet, it would be a surprise if he won.

Most of us have only one direct competitor, namely ourselves. The usual finisher rate is about 30%, and just making it to the finish within all the cut-offs is an achievement.

28 degrees tomorrow and 80% humidity (" that's bad " according to the Rd ), but conditions should improve tomorrow evening for anyone still in the game.

Better try again to get some sleep ...

Firedance

TFBubendorfer wrote: »

F***, I can't sleep!

Both reigning 24 hrs world champions are here, as well as last year's winners. Two or three other contenders; Mike Wardian is actually an outside bet, it would be a surprise if he won.

Most of us have only one direct competitor, namely ourselves. The usual finisher rate is about 30%, and just making it to the finish within all the cut-offs is an achievement.

28 degrees tomorrow and 80% humidity (" that's bad " according to the Rd ), but conditions should improve tomorrow evening for anyone still in the game.

Better try again to get some sleep ...

Good luck!!! You guys are mega

TFBubendorfer

menoscemo wrote: »

There's a few sneaky hills in this one

All uphill from 100k to 125, and apparently a mile at around 110 k is brutal. Then an actual mountain at 100 miles that does not even have a road and will have to be crossed in the middle of the night. And to top it all off a big climb from 190-210 k . Fun

Señor Fancy Pants

Best of luck man! What a thing to be part of, that's hero stuff right there!

ger664

TFBubendorfer wrote: »

F***, I can't sleep!

Go put a towel on a sun lounger

Lacedaemonian

Hi to everybody from Sparta

Few words for this year's race.Both 24h world champs and last year's winners(m/f) are running and there are many more world class runners as many Spartathlon "veterans".In fact i think that this year's race has the most talented field ever and many here share my opinion....Another interesting thing about this year is that it is the first time that there will be "live streaming" during the 36h race(u can follow it at the site of the race)...The weather (till now...)is not bad(not very hot as in 2013)but there is humidity as it was rainning the days before.Let's hope that it will not get worse so there will be an high % of finishers....380 Spartathletes from 50 countries(i think) is a new record for the race and the demand for getting in is growing year after year(the real reason they can't have more athletes is that all the hotels in Sparta and nearby are full so they don't have where to put the athletes and their crews.Last year the USA team stayed at Gythio-the port of Sparta-nearby the sea.Not bad at all if you want to relax after 246km...)....

Best of luck to all the athletes

Lacedaemonian

P.S. as the organizers notice ,there is a very clear trend the last 2 years.More and more of the volunteers(greeks and foreigners) at the C.P.'s and at the other posts that need to be manned are runners themselves....

Firedance

the live tracker & the website don't seem to be working? anyone else able to get access?

Ososlo

Firedance wrote: »

the live tracker & the website don't seem to be working? anyone else able to get access?

nope nada:(

kit3

I got access earlier - 5 Irish & Thomas safely through checkpoint 11 - times ranging from about 11.05 to 11.31 (as far as I can remember) . Can't access it atm

Edit - for later, is there more than 5 Irish ??

kit3

Tracker working again but no further update on the Irish & Thomas. Think I remember from last year that it only updates at certain checkpoints ??

Firedance

kit3 wrote: »

Tracker working again but no further update on the Irish & Thomas. Think I remember from last year that it only updates at certain checkpoints ??

yeah looks that way, some of the checkpoints are highlighted on the list, looks like we wont see any updates till they go through CP 22, c'mon lads

Enduro

Interesting to see Dan Lawson leading at the moment. I reckon that'll burn out when the hills hit.

Ivan Cudin running ahead of Florian Reus... Ivan isn't running as conservatively as he had indicated he would be pre-race.

Good to see Cork - based Jan Uzik giving it welly in 11th! (Winner of Belfast 24 hour last year).


All very early days

BeepBeep67

Thomas through CP22, which is about 80k I think

No Name Surname CP Date Time Country Sex
195 Thomas Bubendorfer 22 2015-09-25 15:18:42 Austria Male

menoscemo

BeepBeep67 wrote: »

Thomas through CP22, which is about 80k I think

CP 22 is the second checkpoint we will get an update on, it's at 81km. Eddie Gallen, TFB and Thomas Kilmas have all passed through in the last half hour, the other boys still have another 45 minutes. No panic, I know they are all planning to start slow and steady.

Firedance

Brian Ankers just gone through 22

menoscemo

Don has gone through, but still no sign of Anto....

Firedance

menoscemo wrote: »

Don has gone through, but still no sign of Anto....

yeah still nothing, how is he for time?

menoscemo

Firedance wrote: »

yeah still nothing, how is he for time?

In theory he should have been through by 2:30 our time....

Firedance

menoscemo wrote: »

In theory he should have been through by 2:30 our time....

I thought that... he went through 11 with Don, maybe just an issue with the chip or something, hopefully.

menoscemo

Firedance wrote: »

I thought that... he went through 11 with Don, maybe just an issue with the chip or something, hopefully.

Sounds like he is gone. 19% have already dropped out by CP 22 apparently. It's gonna be a tough one this year by the looks of it.

menoscemo

Thomas Kilmas and Eddie gallen through CP 28 in 109th and 124th
Cork Based Slovakian Jan Uzik is in 8th

Enduro

Jan is up to 6th at CP35.... holy feck!

Ivan Cudin now lurking in 2nd and likely to take the lead soon enough I would guess. Fairly consistant 5 minute gaps between the top 10. Good racing!

Hopefully the cooling as we head to the evening will help the Irish.

menoscemo

menoscemo wrote: »

Thomas Kilmas and Eddie gallen through CP 28 in 109th and 124th
Cork Based Slovakian Jan Uzik is in 8th

TFB also went through CP 28, in fact he was a few places ahead of the other Thomas

menoscemo

Don and Brian also went through CP28 well ahead of the cut off and appear to be moving through the field

Next big CP is 35 at 125km at the top of the first big climb. By My calculations they have until 9pm our time to get there...

menoscemo

Eddie and the two Thomas' all went through CP 35 (halfway) with about 2 hours to spare. They all look to be going very well.

menoscemo

Brian and Don both through CP 35 in plenty of time.

menoscemo

Dan Lawson holding on to the lead through CP 52, 10 minutes behind is the world 24hr champion Florian Reus, while last years winner Ivan Cudin has dropped back to 4th place having been in 2nd at the previous CP.

The leading lady (24hr world Champion Katalin Nagy) is up to 5th overall and just 3 minutes behind Cudin who looks to be fading...

ultraman1

Reus wins,lawson second jansen 3rd..katalin nagy 4th place(1st lady)...ankers ,eddie and two thomas's over the mountain safely,don is out ..weather has taken a big change now it lashing rain here now

ultraman1

All the lads thro 197k cp...

ultraman1

All the lads thro 197k cp...

tang1

ultraman1 wrote: »

All the lads thro 197k cp...

Hard luck Anto.

ThebitterLemon

What happened A, was it the heat?

TbL

ultraman1

ThebitterLemon wrote: »

What happened A, was it the heat?

TbL

No excuses..

ultraman1

Eddie the legend has finished 31:13...

ultraman1

Two thomas's due in bot 45 mins and brian in about 2+ hrs

menoscemo

ultraman1 wrote: »

Two thomas's due in bot 45 mins and brian in about 2+ hrs

Thomas B and Thomas K finished just 25 seconds apart in 33hrs 24
Brian Ankers also finished in 35hrs03

Nice one lads. 4 out of 6 ain't bad; just 174 of the 373 starters managed to finish.

Edit: The two Thomas' seemingly ran in together over the last 50-60k and arrived at exactly the same time in 74th and 75th place. Brian was 130th.
Jan Uzik, despite being up in 6th at one point, doesn't appear to have finished.

ultraman1

Two thomas's in 33:30 and brian 36hrs...

Firedance

menoscemo wrote: »

Thomas B and Thomas K finished just 25 seconds apart in 33hrs 24
Brian Ankers also finished in 35hrs03

Nice one lads. 4 out of 6 ain't bad; just 174 of the 373 starters managed to finish.

Edit: The two Thomas' seemingly ran in together over the last 50-60k and arrived at exactly the same time in 74th and 75th place. Brian was 130th.
Jan Uzik, despite being up in 6th at one point, doesn't appear to have finished.

:eek: just highlights the momentous achievement taking part in this race really is, well done guys, all of you.

TFBubendorfer

Quick update: everything hurts!

Me and the other Thomas ran together for the last 60k having been close to each other for most of the race. He sacrificed at least 10 minutes by sticking with me when running became virtually impossible, for which I am very grateful. Finishing together was amazing.

In fact, the finish is just amazing, hairs raising on the back of the head, close to tears kind of stuff.

And, unsurprisingly, it was the hardest thing I've ever done.

Ososlo

TFBubendorfer wrote: »

Quick update: everything hurts!

Me and the other Thomas ran together for the last 60k having been close to each other for most of the race. He sacrificed at least 10 minutes by sticking with me when running became virtually impossible, for which I am very grateful. Finishing together was amazing.

In fact, the finish is just amazing, hairs raising on the back of the head, close to tears kind of stuff.

And, unsurprisingly, it was the hardest thing I've ever done.

Legend:D
Massive congratulations and I know the report will be fittingly EPIC!

Ososlo

https://www.facebook.com/1141115452/videos/10207275806230372/

dintbo

Brilliant achievement Thomas, well done!