Where Dreams Go To Die
featuring Gary Robbins
featuring Gary Robbins
I am so glad I didn't listen to that voice in my head as I sat in Tacoma traffic that said "go home...Blake will understand"...
IT WAS AMAZING!!
It's kind of amazing that Ethan was able to create an engaging and gripping story when he wasn't allowed out on the trail with Gary. But he did.
Where Dreams Go To Die is what was written on of the bibs that Lazarus Lake (the Race Director) gave him during the race.
To give a little back ground about this "marathon"...Lazarus heard about the 1977 escape of James Earl Ray (the assassin of Martin Luther King Jr.) from the Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary. It took Ray 55 hours to cover 8 miles. He figured he could have done AT LEAST 100 miles in that amount of time. Soooo he created the race and named it "Barkley Marathon" after a longtime friend and running buddy Barry Barkley.
Read more about it here!
(I'm not naming a race after you Amy. Sorry)
This race is INSANE. 5 loops of approximately 20 miles each through the back woods of Tennessee in the Frozen Head State Park (that name is super inviting isn't it?) with NO aide stations, NO pacers, and you have to find 13 books that you tear a page from to show you ran the entire loop...'cause the course isn't marked. Oh, and each loop has a12 hour cut off and the race has a 60 hour time limit.
Since 1995 only 18 people have finished the race. FINISHED.
Gary ran in 2016 and dropped in loop 5, so he was determined to finish what he started and came back for 2017.
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| Gary Robbins and I |
The big story is that he made a wrong turn in loop 5 and ended up running the wrong trail (even though he found all the books) and finished in 60 hours and SIX SECONDS. It was heart breaking to read about but even more to see on a giant screen. (Blake and I knew how the story ended, but we were still on the edge of our seats with our hands over our mouths just WISHING he would get what he had worked so hard for.)
Gary's opening statements were hard to listen to, because it was so clear that this race has broken his heart. He was emotional just reading from his pages. I wasn't sure he was going to get through it without breaking down.
It reminded me of the Tucson marathon in 2010. I ended up calling my sister Abby (she was the only one out of FIVE that answered) on the course and breaking down crying because it was going so horribly wrong.
I can't help but wonder how I would have felt if I had to multiply that by FIVE LOOPS and sleep deprivation. Never mind the amount of training that he suffered through just to get there.
He did sound much better after the movie and he is determined to go back in 2018 and make it happen. He said he would go back as many times as it takes...his wife was sitting on the side of the stage and wasn't as stoked for that. :) But she's an ultra runner as well, so she knows how important this is for him.
She was a rock star support crew for him as well. WITH a baby the first year, and 2 year old the second year...all those training hours...wow.
This will sound kind of awful, but there is something really positive in seeing such an accomplished runner struggle with the same issues that I (and every runner I've spoken to) struggle with.
Our mental voices during the run...
Our motivation during training...
Remembering to hydrate properly and eat enough calories...
Needing everything to be the way you planned it to be, and then changing your mind at the last second.
I will say that seeing him drink ketchup straight from the bottle made me gag. Just thinking about it now, makes me gag.
We had about an hour for a Q/A after the film and I could have happily listened for another hour. Both Gary and Ethan were really great giving well thought and thoughtful answers to everyone's questions. The energy from the event was just awesome. I could have watched the movie over again the same night.
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