Barkley Fall Classic - 2018/09

The Barkley Fall Classic (BFC) 50 is an annual small brother of the infamous Barkley Marathons race, known as the world toughest trail race. Both are held in Frozen Head State Park in Tennessee. 

The Barkley Marathons race was conceived by the race director Gary Cantrell (Lazarus Lake) based on the story of the escape of James Earl Ray, imprisoned at Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary for the killing of Martin Luther King. James Ray escaped from the prison into the Frozen Head territory but was subsequently found after 60 hours having gone only 8 miles. Gary claimed that he would be able to cover 100 miles in the same terrain within 60 hours and that’s how the race was formed. 

The BFC and Barkley Marathons, although use parts of the same trails offer very different challenges. While the BFC course is partially marked Barkley Marathons is unmarked and requires navigation in the difficult terrain partially at night. The distance and weather play a role too, with Barkley Marathons being held in April usually in cold and wet conditions and BCF held in Sept with temperatures often exceeding 30C and high humidity. Both races share secretive race route, only revealed the day before the start. 

Our travel to the race venue was not ideal, a 30 hour total flight time flight to Nashville, followed by a 3 hour drive on Friday left little time, but to register, attend the pre-race dinner and get all the gear ready for the race. 

After an early wake-up at 5am on Sat I lined up for the start at sunrise near the front of the field. The start is customarily signaled by Laz lighting a cigarette and without any hesitation, we were all off into the darkness of the forest. The first couple of miles were flat, but soon after that, we turned into the Bird Mountain trail. The gradients were not particularly steep and parts even runnable. Soon the field was strung out on the single track trail and we were climbing at a decent pace. With GPS being disallowed during the race it was difficult to measure how quickly we were moving but it seemed like a good pace and felt comfortable. After the Bird Mountain climb, we descended via the SOB Ditch and followed the North Boundary trail. After 2.5 hours I reached the first checkpoint, got my bib number punched, stocked up on water and went on.

Some confusion ensued on the turn off towards Coffin Springs where apparently a lot of people got lost last year, but I studied and memorized the map well enough to allow me to move through all the unmarked turns without making a mistake. The new trail section of Stallion Mountain was rather uneventful, other than being covered in deep puddles of mud, which made keeping shoes dry impossible, and soon we arrived at the Church signifying the second aid station.

Quick refill of water bottles and a big drink of water and I was on the move again, feeling good and confident. At this stage I knew the real difficulty must begin soon, but I was not expecting what was just about to come. The quick succession of Math Lab Hill and Testicle Spectacle, which are both sections off-trail following power lines cuts and infested with briars, poison ivy and XXXX, quickly verified the perception of the difficulty of the course. There were parts where you had to use legs and hands to pull yourself up and parts where the only option to go down was to slide on your backside. I arrived at the prison overheated, dehydrated and low on calories and had to sit down for 3 min to refuel and drink. 

After scaling the prison wall and getting our bibs punched by three times Barkley winner Jared Campbell we went through the rats infested tunnel under the prison and we were on the other side faced with a steep hill. Words can’t describe the next section of the course, called Rat Jaw. The distance of just over 1km with elevation change of also almost 1km took me over 1.5 hours to cover. Most of it on hands and knees. I have lost count of how many times we came to a false top just to see the hill raising again. There were times where I began to seriously doubt if there was an end to this hill and the 33C heat on the exposed climb was not helping. As an icing on the cake we had to climb to the top of the observation tower to get our bibs punched when we scaled the top of the hill.

Luckily the next 8km was a very runnable downhill trail and after a few min I was able to get into a good running rhythm. Coming to the Old South Mac trail we stopped unsure if we should follow the rail to the left or right, but remembering the memorized map I was sure we had to go left, which was quickly confirmed by another runner and after another 30 min I reached Laz, who punched my bib and asked if I was going to continue. 

At this point runners have a choice of finishing the classic marathon distance or going further to complete 50km if they are within the time limit of 9.5 hours. For me it wasn’t even a question and after a change of socks I was off for the final loop around Chimney Tops and Spice Wood trails. This section, supposedly 8 km is in fact probably closer to 12km giving a total distance of 54-55km. It took me 3 hours to complete and the climb to Chimney Tops seemed to go on forever. Eventually, I reached Laz again and knew that I had about 3km to the finish and 18 min to do it under 11hours, so I knew I was going to have to run even if I didn’t want to. 

 This was an exhausting 3km fighting with time and when I reached the finish I was totally spent and needed to lay down motionless for 5 min. 

The big question is – is this the hardest 50km trail race? 
I don’t know, but with over 3.1km vertical elevation gain and the extremely hot weather, it was definitely one of the hardest.