Ultrarunning’s Young Guns

When Marco Olmo won last year’s Ultra Trail Tour du Mont Blanc, one of the most prestigious ultra-marathon races in the world, it was hardly a surprise. It was, in fact, his second consecutive victory in the 150K race, and he handily beat a triad of American ultra stars: Scott Jurek, Hal Koerner and Karl Meltzer.

The key to his success? His advanced age. Olmo is 59 - a robust example of the central truth of ultrarunning: victory goes to the seasoned athlete. The common assumption, ever since Gordy Ainsleigh lost his horse prior to the 1974 Western States Endurance Ride and decided to run the course (and create a new sport) - was that it takes years and years and thousands of miles to condition an ultrarunner's body to withstand the pounding rigors inherent to the sport.

Recently, however, three young guns have turned that assumption, and the sport, on its head. Anton Krupicka and brothers Kyle and Erik Skaggs have simply blown up the world of ultrarunning - and proven that you don't need an AARP card to excel. 

Pick just about any of the most difficult ultras and these three are not only winning them, but often setting scorching new course records in the process. Krupicka won the 2006 Leadville 100 at just 22 years of age, and followed that up with a repeat win last year. Erik Skaggs teamed with Kyle to win last year's inaugural GORE-TEX TransRockies Run, a six-day stage race in Colorado, and earlier this year captured the Quad Dipsea in his first attempt at that brutal course; finishing less than one minute off the all-time record set in 1992.

Kyle, perhaps the most talented of the trio, annihilates records nearly every time he pins on a race bib. In last year's Wasatch 100, he not only won at his first attempt at the distance, he beat Karl Meltzer's course record by nearly 10 minutes. This July, he lined up at the Hardrock 100, which - with apologies to the Western States - is generally considered to be the hardest ultra in the world, and he won it in a truly astonishing time of 23 hours, 23 minutes.

In breaking the course record set in 2007 by Jurek, (by nearly three hours) Skaggs inspired encomiums generally reserved for superheroes. As race director Dale Garland told the Durango Herald, "I didn't think this was possible. I don't know if there is a superlative I can use for this. This is one of the great athletic barriers that we thought would never be broken." 

If Kyle surprised the race director, he didn't surprise Krupicka, a close friend with whom he lived for four months earlier this year in Silverton, Colorado.

"The thing about Hardrock," says Krupicka, who helped crew for Kyle that day, "is that we thought the record was within reach, for sure." They probably should have told the race organizers, who had to scramble all day to set up aid stations - some of which Kyle reached two hours before they were scheduled to open.

The Skaggs brothers were reared in the tiny town of Glenwood, New Mexico, close to the Gila Wilderness. "There wasn't a lot to do there," remembers Kyle. "We mostly played outdoors all the time." Their high school didn't have a track team, and though Erik, 25, ran cross-country, Kyle, 23, disdained even that. "It was too structured," he says, "I only ran to get fit for rock climbing."

That changed between Kyle's freshman and sophomore years at Evergreen State College in Washington, where a friend talked him into trying out for cross-country. He made the NAIA team, though he now says that his collegiate training "was a bit of a joke." 

"It was great," he says, "my coach, Craig Dixon, was a great, great role model, but I didn't take it that seriously." What his training did affect, though, was older brother Erik, who studied at New Mexico State. "He'd come home on summer break; we'd go for runs and he'd kick my ass," says Erik. "So, obviously, I had to start training to avoid that."

And they do train. Each of them pulls monster training mileage, with Krupicka leading the way. "I might do a little more mileage than Kyle," says Krupicka, "I average right around 180 miles a week leading up to a big race. But going into this year's Western States I actually did one week with 37 hours of running. I think that added up to about 260 miles."

That effort went for naught when the Western States was cancelled this year due to raging forest fires and poor air quality. It also brought on something rare: an overtraining injury, as Krupicka is now fighting a neuroma in his foot.

"It's been frustrating, especially with Western States being cancelled," he says. "Right now I'm less than four weeks out from the Leadville 100 and haven't run in three weeks, so I'm getting a little anxious."

The neuroma is unusual, because even given the extreme training the three indulge in, they've remained remarkably injury-free. It could be that their very youth, the factor that had theoretically limited their ability to compete at the highest levels, is a key to their success.

Or it could be simply that they're excelling because of their position in life. San Francisco resident Dean Karnazes is 44, and is perhaps the world's most well-known ultrarunner.

"I'm well aware of what these guys are doing. They're so strong, so grounded and super-mature that their mindset has really helped them," Karnazes says. "But this is where they are in their lives - no kids, not married. They do insane training miles and are just rocking it. They're incredible. I don't know how else to say it, but they're kicking serious ass." And just to point out how different ultrarunners are from the mainstream recreational runner, Karnazes apologized for the spotty cell reception during his interview. He was running home from Half Moon Bay, where he had just given a keynote address at an executive retreat at the Four Seasons.