Amro Alansari

Amro is an ultra runner from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. On this episode we talk about how he ended up calling Saskatoon home after living in many places around the world. We discuss his ascension from casual and curious runner to a bonafide long distance  ultra runner. I have shared a few miles with Amro and have always enjoyed his friendly demeanour and relentless spirit. I hope this podcast gives you a little window into what it’s like to hang out with such a great human. 

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Artwork by Gavin de Lint 

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Thank you to the Burning Hell for the use of their song Holidaymakers. Check them out at 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Amro Elanzari is an ultrarunner from Saskatoon. Originally from Saudi Arabia, Amro found his way to Saskatchewan via a schooling opportunity at the University of Saskatchewan. After moving around other cities in the world, Saskatoon has always called him back. He lives there and trains and competes in ultra marathons and helps run the joggers and loggers running club. In this episode, we talk about his quick ascension from casual runner to a long-distance ultrarunner who completed the Sinister 7 100 miler in 2025.

SPEAKER_00 0:30

Enjoy the last day of the storm perfect.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

You are listening to the Saskatchewan podcast with your host, Jason Burns, the podcast where we talk to Saskatchewan runners about the people on places that inspire them. On this episode of the Saskatchewan podcast, we are joined by Amro Alonsari. How are you doing today, Amro? I'm doing great. How are yourself, Jason? I'm doing really well. Thanks for uh stopping by the podcast today. Appreciate it. Absolutely. All right. Well, you're a a regular listener, so why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself? All right.

SPEAKER_04 1:26

Well, yeah, I have been playing tag for a little bit. So um even though you gave me some time to organize myself, I don't think I've done a lot. And I uh tasked you with trying to keep this conversation on track. So I'll do my best here. But um yeah, my um my name is Amaro. I moved to Saskatoon quite some time ago. It's been over 20 years. Grew up overseas, um quite a bit different weather, different culture, different everything. Um got my degree at the university here at U of S. And uh throughout, I kind of didn't really have a whole lot of uh an active lifestyle. I was I was your typical nerd at school. Um okay. From there, um moved around the world a little bit for for work, and um Saskatoon keeps uh pulling back, and I I keep moving back here. So I keep telling people um Saskatoon wouldn't let go, and uh this is my fourth, third time moving back to Saskatoon in the last over the last 20 years. Cool. Where are some of the other places you lived? I grew up in the Middle East. I grew up in uh a city called Genda on the West Coast of Saudi Arabia. Nice, um quite humid, quite uh not as many people would think of that region as as desert were there. It's kind of sheltered, got mountains to the west or to the east of us, sea to the west. So temperature year-round ranges from like 25 to 35, right? With the odd extremes. Yep. But um, yeah, grew up there, um bounced around between Saskatoon, lived across the Middle East, and lived um east coast of Saudi for a little bit for work, did a little bit uh Bahrain, um, worked in Dubai for a little bit and got a couple of work opportunities to even pop into Japan and even Houston. So moved all over the place and then even coming back to Canada here. I actually lived in Lloydminster for a few years. Um that's where kind of the whole running craze running story kind of started, really. Uh out in Lord Minster.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

Cool. So when you were a young lad and decided to come or go to university, how did Saskatoon come on your radar?

SPEAKER_04 4:02

Well, that's kind of a little bit of a long story. Um teenager wanted to get away from home. But um yeah, I was straight out of high school, had a fortunate opportunity to uh actually get a scholarship. The the way that kind of it all worked out was you get to pick a uh a major that you want to take and a um a country. And at the time there weren't too many options, but um Canada and the states were were top on my list. And um for lack of any other better reason, I was like, Canada's the same as the states, and why not, right? So my university major um and picked Canada and the uh the scholarship program that I was with, they kind of sent students to top universities across the country and the U of S ranked high, and that's how I ended up in Saskatoon. I uh this is gonna, I'm gonna date myself here a little bit, but this is before you can hop on the internet and uh do a quick Google search. But I recall getting the acceptance letter and uh trying to figure out where where am I going to and uh talking to my dad. I remember I couldn't even pronounce the University of Saskatchewan. So um yeah, and um it went from uh from yeah, coastal warm weather year-round to uh landing down here in in October, and I and I remember freezing my butt off. Oh wow, yeah. This this October's been mild, it's it's a mild winter, but it was freezing hell.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

You got thrown right into the deep freeze, and you had six months of winter right on arrival.

SPEAKER_04 6:01

100%.

SPEAKER_01 6:02

I wouldn't feel too bad about not being able to pronounce Saskatchewan. There's people who were born in Canada who I know I you always hear sometimes Saskatchewan. I'm like, no, it's Saskatchewan. I know it's not spelt that way, but come on.

SPEAKER_03 6:14

Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 6:16

Yeah, no, that's awesome that you settled in Saskatoon and like it so much. So you said your running running story kind of started when you were living in Lloyd?

SPEAKER_04 6:24

That's where it kind of really took off. I like growing growing up and even going through university and like early in my career, uh, I had different focus, uh family, um, career. I was traveling quite a bit, so historically kind of always struggled with my weight, went up and down all over the place. Uh, didn't have uh the healthiest uh lifestyle. Um I was a smoker for a prolonged period of uh uh my life and um I tried to kind of get healthy in and out. Uh I started running honestly for the sake of ticking the cardio box.

SPEAKER_03 7:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:04

Kind of early in like after university, right? I would run. I would my goal was to get a 5k out, and I would go run as fast as I can, uh, take the 5k box and uh and call it a day. Hated it. Like hated it the whole time. Um and I kind of fell in and out, in and out of it, started going to the gym, life got busy, and and I kind of that that went sideways. Um kind of around 2018, I was dealing with life stress, stressors. Um, decided to get healthy, started going to the gym. I actually picked up um hot yoga. I found it both mentally and physically a good good space for me. And um closer to kind of end of 2019, um my brother and I have like a tradition where for birthdays we do a uh like a nice gift and also a gag gift. So for that year, toward the end of 2019, his birthday is in January. Um we're kind of dabbling in like what should I get you for a nice gift, right? Like what do you want? And uh he decided at the time that he wanted to tackle a Spartan event. So nice, yeah, yeah. Um he jumped in and he was trading for the 5k, and I think he ended up doing it in January of 2020. Um at the time, um again, we we've got a little bit of competitive spirit between us two, and uh a month later he decided to tackle the 10K uh Spartan. Right. And he was kind of flaunting it a little bit and teasing me and was like, hey, you used to rent, see if you can pick this up. Um fast forward a few months later, COVID happened, uh everything kind of shut down, and I needed an excuse to do something other than walk from my bedroom to my fridge and then to my home office. So in Lloydminster, there's a great great community uh there on uh Lloydminster runners. Um I've kind of been watching them, call it like 2019 for over a year, right? They used to they put in a half marathon event and uh uh they do they used to do like fun fun runs and beer runs and all that kind of stuff, and it kind of left me um not knowing a whole lot about the running community, to be honest. Like when I used to run earlier, I was kind of doing it solo. Um but I've been watching this group, COVID happened, and kudos to them. Uh they ended up uh going through with a program that I think at that point they would have been doing two, three years, maybe, but a couched 5k program. Okay. And at that point, I'm like, well, I've got nothing to lose, right? That that kind of interest into running kind of got sparked with talking to my brother, and um the program was supposed to start, I want to say April 1st, April 2nd, something like that, uh 2020. So I'm like, again, got nothing to lose. Um they were doing it virtually, and back in those times I was trying to figure out something to keep me busy, right? So joined the group and they did the info session. Again, kudos to Mackenzie and Taryn and uh Chris Bogue um for uh for pulling together with that program. Uh did the info session, did the intro, and our homework was that we're supposed to do three runs a week, and it's the couch 5K program where you kind of run walk at the beginning, and you're supposed to, I think, run three times a week. The keener, the bored person I was, uh I decided to maybe jump in a little too fast. And I think I finished that program. I ended up running every day uh following the program. I think it's a 16, maybe 12-week program. Ended up finishing it in half the duration, right? Um and I remember talking to Mackenzie Brown, who was running the program, like, well, what do I do next, right? He's like, Well, you can keep going to the 10K, right? So from there, I pushed to the 10K. And by the end of that couch to 5K program, I had ticked off the 10K. I found it at the time with COVID, lockdown, life stressors, it was it was an easy and almost belt-free excuse for me to go outside and just enjoy the outdoors. Uh I didn't think I was gonna like running in colder weather, um, but I quite enjoyed it once you learn how to bundle and and uh dress up. Um and I think the the turn into what really made me fall in love with running and specifically trail running. Um at one point I was talking to Mackenzie, and again, this is a COVID restrictions are starting to loosen up later that summer. And um McKenzie made a comment that hey, there's a group, a kind of like a small group that's going to do a uh a trail run. Uh, would you be interested? Like, I don't know what a trail run is. I don't know if I have the gear, but sure, I'll I'll join you. And uh it was McKenzie, uh, a guy called uh Luke Kitchen and I that that ended up going out there. And I happened to wear the same size of shoes as McKenzie, and he ended up letting me borrow a pair. And at that point, I think maybe the longest I've ran nine, maybe 10K. And uh there's a an area just outside of Floyd, about 20, 25 minute drive, uh called Mount Joy. It's a little ski hill. Um local community ski hill. The loop that's out there, seven and a half kilometers, uh 350 meters of gain when you take all the shoots and the uh the the ramps there. So I ended up putting together, we went to the first loop and felt really good, really enjoyed the the ability to kind of have your your mind not completely spaced out and you're watching for a route, watching for a slip and slide and and and a rock here and there. So um I was very easily convinced to do a second lap, and I was warned that even though I ran in the past or have been running for the last few months, uh new muscles are gonna start hurting after a turn running. So um yeah, from there I think the rest is kind of a bit of history, fell in love with with uh being outdoors, and uh it opened up different ways for me to to exercise and and be out there and whether it's hiking or or running or even stage racing, it it opened up uh a new world for me, and and I'm forever grateful for that for that crew in uh in Lloyd.

SPEAKER_01 14:06

Yeah, that's awesome. So when was your um when were you able to do your first actual uh did you do like a road race too, or did you go right into a trail race as your first one?

SPEAKER_04 14:18

Yeah, I didn't again jump in maybe with uh with both feet here, but um the the the whole program, the idea from the five to uh couch to five K program out in Lloyd was it used to lead up to their titanium half marathon, right? Okay, cool. Everyone that was doing the 5K, the end of the program lined up with um the race. So and the race had different distances five, ten, and and twenty-one. Um because of COVID, because of restrictions and all the races that were canceled, they ended up doing that race virtually. So um and and I believe that year they ended up trying to kind of push it out to see if it will line up and okay, but I ended up actually running a virtual half marathon instead of uh a 5k at the end of that program. Again, for people that know me and uh people around me, I always say my my running career, my my start of running, don't do what I did. I don't recommend it. Jumped in a little too fast. Probably shouldn't have run that half marathon three, four months into starting running, but I did it, I enjoyed it. Um there's another small community just also kind of southwest of Floyd Wainwright. Um and they do again, they had like uh a running series, and one of their races was the uh 5k bison dash. And um it lined up that it was at a period of time where COVID restriction were loose enough that they were able to hold that race in person, and like we had to stagger apart, like the start line, it was a small race, so I don't know, maybe 50 people, and I think they had to do it in waves too, or two different groups. And Shane, the race director, um went and like painted marks on on the pavement for us to line up apart. I think we had to start with face masks as well. But that was my first in-person event. Okay, cool. Quite quite enjoyed it. Um and I and that kind of what led into the rest of that 2020 and then uh me jumping into running a little bit too fast.

SPEAKER_01 16:38

That's kind of similar to our story too, just kind of uh we were doing Spartans, and then yeah, during COVID, we just decided to start running long distance and just grew from there. But it was good, kind of a blessing, I guess. Oh, 100%. 100% for sure.

SPEAKER_04 16:51

Yeah, I love hearing from that 5k. Um my next race from that 5k was a um my first ultra later that year, which again, I don't recommend it, but um I remember riding that high after that race, uh the bison dash, and uh I was talking to Mackenzie about like how much I enjoyed the thrill of being in-person race and being out there and kind of competing. Um kind of sparked that plug in me, or sparked that uh fire in me. And uh he jokingly, and and McKenzie is an accomplished triathlete triathlete and done tons of ultras at that point. Um, and I'm pretty sure he was joking, but he was like, Well, there's one race that hasn't been canceled, and I uh excitedly jumped him like, well, sign me up. Yep. Uh not knowing that it was a 100k event. Oh, nice. Was that the iron horse? That was definitely the iron horse. My nice my first ultra 10 six months into into running, so count to 100k and six yeah, six months. I know you've I don't recommend it.

SPEAKER_01 18:07

I noticed you have done something at Iron Horse most years since 2020, so that's pretty cool. I that explains, I guess, if you were around Lloyd, you got kind of a firsthand, you know, not too far from it.

SPEAKER_04 18:18

So not from Lloyd. It's a great event. The the race director out there, Monique, uh, has established a great community out there. Um, and a big group from Lloyd goes up every year.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

For sure, yeah. Yeah, I love hearing these stories because I don't I've never really known that Lloyd was such like a little running hot spot, and then there's little races in Wainwright just across the border, and yeah, that's awesome. That's yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 18:44

And those like small run running communities, run groups, uh they they they make a difference, right? Because my impression, and I and again I told uh McKenzie and Taryn that before. Um my my impression of group runs, maybe this is before they went mainstream and social media uh post-COVID as well. But my impression of group runs that there were a bunch of pretentious people and they're running and watching their cadence and all that, right? As soon as I got you get to know them and your experience probably a lot like many others, uh, and myself, like they're the best group of people, welcoming and want nothing but to see you succeed, right?

SPEAKER_01 19:27

For sure. Yeah, I actually just recently said that, just like know so many have met so many great people through running that I was saying that I think that's like the best group of people that I've ever met, no matter what how my hobbies and interests have changed over the years. I'm like, I think I think like the running community is I think top-notch people for sure.

SPEAKER_04 19:46

100%.

SPEAKER_01 19:47

Yeah, actually, I'm I'm with you. I when we used to do um uh CrossFit, our coached in like any you could do like maybe like around the block, like a 400-meter sprint and then back to strength work, like it was, but they really frowned upon running. So I kind of like absorbed that um attitude for a while. So when we'd walk our dog around the park and I'd see someone running like in some kind of running shoes, I'm just like, oh, these people has just like I think I actually think I started going to park run because I wanted to like try to beat runners because I'm like in my head, I thought I didn't like runners for some reason. Same thing, I thought they were pretentious and like, and I mean obviously they're all training and working, they're they just look grouchy because they're digging deep and working hard, but yeah, I'm pretty sure I started running just to so I could like compete with runners, and and now they're all my best friends, so that's good. I always say I hope I wasn't rude to somebody that's now somebody that I'm I'm close to before I knew them. Yeah, for sure. So your first hundred KOd Iron Horse, how did that uh go for you? That's that's a that's a big jump. That's that's impressive.

SPEAKER_04 20:47

Yeah, it was the steep learning curve, right? And I'm thankful again for for um people that kind of mentored and coached me along the way because I had no clue what I was doing, right? Didn't know what nutrition was and how to feed for myself, or um the whole pacing strategy, changing gear, what what stuff you should have on you, uh fueling, um down to like um chafing and blisters. But uh Ross Thompson, again, legend out uh in the in the Lloyd community. Um I can't tell you how many runs, training runs we would go out uh around Lloyd or even to Vermillion uh provincial park. And I'm sure Ross called me uh a couple of names just the stuff that I was trying and trying to figure out uh what to do. But the the race itself, um for for listeners that maybe not familiar with it, it's uh it's 100k, big loop. You start from St. Paul, Alberta, just about an hour and a half uh northeast of Edmonton, and you run all the way to Elk Point, another community, and you Turn around and back, and there's very little, if any, overlap on the course. So that appealed to me as a runner, and at that point I was kind of uh taking it all in to being able to explore places that you can drive to or just easily walk up to. In my head, the elevation profile was fairly simple, 1500 meters, I think, give or take in that 100K. Um, and in my head also, you get a generous cutoff. It's 20 hours. And uh maybe again, part of uh the thing that worked in my favor throughout my running is uh kind of ignorance is bliss type of mentality. Uh you get 20 hours per cutoff. I did the math in my head. I'm like, I can walk 5k an hour if I wanted to. If I do a little bit of run here and there, I'm fine, right? For sure. Um again, not appreciating the uh cumulative fatigue, the tiredness, the strain on your body, the the gut issues, hydration, fueling, weather changes, running through the night. And uh I I'm glad to finish. I had two or three times that I was about to quit in that in that race, but uh I snuck in right under the finish uh or the cutoff time at 19 and 19 hours and 20 minutes or so. Yep. That's great. Um I was pretty banged up after the race. I was still learning proper running form. Um again I was heavy heel striker and and worked over the years with uh uh athletic therapists and physiotherapists and coaches to just learn from from uh from that that experience. But it took me it took me out, and uh I think I didn't run for a solid two, three months after that.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Oh wow, yeah, that's quite the stress on the body then. So when you said you almost quit two or three times, and being that that was your first ultra and you didn't have that like know-how to just keep going, what made you keep going?

SPEAKER_04 24:11

Uh a couple of things. Uh again, a great group of people and friends. Um you've done Iron Horse, so you know that point, you get to Elk Elk Point, and it's a grade eight station for the 100 miler, you go through it twice. For the 100k, uh, it's at 60, 65k of the race. Um everybody, it's it's it's like a small family reunion type deal thing. At least that's what I feel like going there now. But um, they've got soup stations, they've got fires going, and everybody's cheering everyone. And for for uh crew members and volunteers, they're just hanging out and waiting for runners, right? Um I remember getting into that uh aid station, and then I'm in pain. Uh feet hurt, back hurt, everything hurts. Um my friend who's also an athletic therapist um was there cheering me on and crewing as well. Um so I got into that aid station, a bunch of friends were there, uh, got some food in me, some hydration, and Haley, uh my my friend who's an athletic therapist, ended up patching me up, and I call it like she put Humpty Dumpty back together, taped me from like my thighs to my toes, uh, an athletic tape, changed shoes, put my uh gear on my pacer, jumped in with me, and uh just slowly, I guess my stubbornness uh what pushed me through, and just one foot after the other. It was a slow, slow, almost death march to to to the finish that last 40k for sure.

SPEAKER_01 25:53

Yeah, that was my low point after I think the second elk point visit. Then you're kind of on that dark old rail bed and there's tall trees kind of swarming you, and I think I walked like 80% of that. Then I slowly got my legs back and I left Happy Hill thinking, I'm like, wow, I'm I'm just running what you know. I think I ran most of it, and then you know that part when you get up and it's like kind of morning and you see that glowing city to off in the distance, and you're like, oh, that's St. Paul, because it feels like you're almost done, but you have like 12 or 16 kilometers of road. That part was nasty, but I think that was just more, I don't know, debilitating or something, knowing knowing what was ahead. It was just like I I don't remember how it broke up, but I feel like it was like seven kilometers of gravel and eight or nine of pavement, or vice versa. But yeah.

SPEAKER_04 26:45

You're you're running that section, especially when I was that slow around midnight past 1 a.m., something like that. Yeah, yeah. And I got warned ahead of this race that it's not actually 100k, it's a hundred and some. Okay, yeah, yeah. And my ignorance, my ignorance self was like, oh, like at that point, if you're on a hundred K, what's an extra five, right?

SPEAKER_03 27:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 27:09

I remember my watch turning to 100K and out in the distance you see the lights for seven power. So mad. So mad.

SPEAKER_01 27:18

It's funny when you hear that before the race, you don't care. You're just like, yeah, whatever, 100, 103, but those extra three kilometers are are horrible at that point in life.

SPEAKER_04 27:26

100% when you're when you're hurting and you're you're putting it all out there, it's it makes it makes a huge, huge difference.

SPEAKER_01 27:33

When you uh went across the finish line, was it fairly busy around this finish, or was it kind of a quiet time?

SPEAKER_04 27:39

It it was really quiet because like I banged off, right? People had already came in and out, and lots of people went went to sleep. I want to say it was two, three in the morning, but okay. Monique was out there, uh, lots of her volunteers, and they had the announcement, and you can hear it as you're walking into the union station. Uh, everybody's cheering and hooting and hollering.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Yeah, it's so so cool. Are you gonna go there and do a race this year too? 100%. It's awesome.

SPEAKER_04 28:08

Uh Monique's Monique's last year, so I've gotta honor it. And like like I said, it's becoming uh a bit of a family reunion. I convinced a bunch of Saskatoon folks now to also do it and um for the last couple of years, and I think we're gonna go out again.

SPEAKER_01 28:25

Awesome. Yeah, we have a close friend of ours who actually paced Melissa at the Iron Horse, and I think she ran 75 or 80k of it as a pacer anyway, so she's got that penciled in, possibly as her first hundred K. So I'm hoping uh yeah, gonna go go out there again as well. That was uh it's such a cool place. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_04 28:43

It's a beautiful time of the year again for for those that are not familiar. This is the first week in an October. Um that part of the country, everything is turning yellow, orange, and all different colors, and and yeah, just it's just gorgeous. It it sounds flat, but there's there's a lot of gravel, but there's beautiful sections of that course too.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

Yeah, for sure. There, I think yeah, lots of people just picture it as like this flat boring thing because they hear the thing about the tracks to trails and the running through gravel. But yeah, there's like when you start off, you kind of run through those little valleys and or I guess around town first, which is super cool, and then that nice valley, and yeah, there's lots of really neat stuff. Or when you my favorites uh over the North Saskatchewan River, when you get to kind of run under the highway and then you're going up those hills in the valley, and the river valley looks like it did, I'm sure, like 500 years ago. It's all natural and beautiful, and yeah, it's great. Love it. I mean for sure. So, what um did you get up to after that first hundred K after your two or three months of recovery?

SPEAKER_04 29:44

Um I after that first experience again, it it was an eye-opener for me. I'm like, well, it's not as easy as walking 5k an hour. Right? So I smarted up and and I was an awful like recovery for me took took forever. Like I think I was I was in pain for solid two, three weeks. Um didn't really run for a few months after. Um, so I I I I thought I'd smarten up and and do it the right way this go around. Yeah, since I enjoyed it so much. So um continued working with uh Haley, uh my traumatic therapist, and she's done wonders and pointed out like most other runners, my uh my strength needs needs some work and my glutes are uh are weak. Yeah. I think her technical term, she might not like that uh that I use this, but her technical diagnosis for me was I've got a weak ass. So I pull on that. Um and then from there I also hired a coach um to help me structure my plan and and and uh structure my volume and training because like I said, I honestly did not know what I was doing. I was just running when I could and increased the volume and it seemed like it was gonna work, but obviously I it didn't work as well as as it should. Um I think the first place winner for the 100k came in that at less than 10 hours that year, and it was just blown away that how can someone cover that distance that fast and it looked fresh. And I think I actually got passed by the first place hundred miler as I was going through. So all of those those people and again others in the community just it blew my mind, and I thought I'd I need to do it smart uh and and better. So um, but Shane Masqueron was uh was the person I chose to to help me and and uh help me build my program. Shane is again an accomplished runner. Um he's heavily involved out in Wainwright, and um he helped me structure the program and uh heard me and and uh maybe put up with me wine way too many times because he's a big advocate of building a big aerobic base, a solid aerobic base, and then going from there, and then you add the distance, the hill, the strength, right? Yep, um, and the hill workouts. And then yeah, I'm grateful. I've learned a lot in that year from Shane. And uh my my big test that year was going back to Iron Horse and seeing if I can improve or do it better, and see how the year went. So 2021 ended up dabbling in a couple of races, uh, did a couple of road races, did um again that the goal was Iron Horse at the end of the year. Uh but 2021 was also my first taste of uh Beaver Flat. Oh, nice. Um that was humbling on a different level. Because at this point in my running, I haven't done a whole lot of truly challenging vertical events, right? Um that year, 2021, I think Beaver Flat was the they weren't sure if they're gonna go ahead again. This is around COVID, and uh they ended up opening up, uh they sold out, and there's a wait list, right? Um I had actually 2021, again, the ignorant in me was was gonna do Golden Ultra, which is a stage race out uh in Good New Jersey. Um coincidentally, that race got canceled um maybe two, three months, three weeks before the event. So end of August. At that point, I had I thought I had already trained and heard about this beaver flat. Mackenzie and a few other people from Lloyd were also running it, and I figured it's called Beaver Flat. Like, how bad can it be? Um showed up that year and got humbled again. Didn't know I I still call it like early in my running journey. I didn't have true appreciation of vertical or elevation again. For sure, beaver flat, no poles, had some high creation, didn't know really the course at all. Um, I remember like my kit was all black, and we all know beaver flat can get hot and windy. I think that year was one of the hottest years out there.

SPEAKER_01 34:27

That was like the hot, like hellwind kind of year, right?

SPEAKER_04 34:30

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It humbled me, but I think again, my stubbornness what what got me through. Um, I made it just under the cutoff for beaver flat, but again, ticked the finish box. Um the big test was that iron horse that year, which is a quite short turnaround between beaver flat and iron horse. But again, working with uh with Shane at the time, he figured again, don't go all out to beaver flat, test it and see how it goes, use it as a training run. And I went out to Iron Horse that year and I managed to shave a few years, a few hours off my time. But um I think training in zone two and and kind of listening to Shane and listening to all the tips. Uh I didn't realize maybe how much I've gained and learned over the year. Um it was a good feeling, but I felt a bit disappointed at the end of Iron Horse because I finished that race and I still felt like there's still something in the tank left. Um which also was the the reason why I ended up going to Iron Horse over and over because it's always been kind of that benchmark test for the year. It's till toward the end of the season, and I get to test my progression every year.

SPEAKER_01 35:54

Yeah, for sure. And you you've steadily improved, obviously.

SPEAKER_04 35:58

Like just I've managed to achieve a few hours here and there, and yeah. I uh the first year I finished Iron Horse and the amount of pain that I was in, I remember talking to Monique and saying I'm never doing this again. And now we're going on year seven.

SPEAKER_01 36:17

Awesome. Do you kind of I've heard from people just you know, when you first started, obviously you didn't have that much experience, but just like the year after year after year of just building your kind of aerobic capacity, and it's just kind of a you know, it takes years, not not months, sort of. I think, hey, that's 100%. Yeah, that's that's what I tell myself. So that's what I want to believe.

SPEAKER_04 36:39

I I I think it works, and and like again, I used to be an awful like people that um don't seem to have like ton of crazy volume, right? They've been doing this, these ultras for five, ten, fifteen years, right? And you see them with what compared to what I was doing, at least for volume, what seemed like maybe the same, maybe just on par, and they'll blow me out of the water at any race, right? Yep. I I'm pretty I'm I'm I'm adamant that that, yeah, that building that capacity year over year makes a huge difference.

SPEAKER_01 37:14

Yeah, for sure. I mean you're you're a proof of it because you're you're still improving five or seven years later, so that's awesome.

SPEAKER_04 37:21

Yeah, I still believe I'm I'm I'm still learning and new to all of this because uh you would be uh every race there's something new, some something different, some trouble treating that you have to do on the fly and I'm constantly learning.

SPEAKER_01 37:38

For sure. And it's interesting too. Like um lots of people that you look at have been you know running ultras kind of, I always say since before they were cool. So like I have friends who've been doing it since like 2012, 2013, even before that. So it's kind of cool to see how I know they're just such experts at it for they have so much experience, so it takes it takes a lot of years.

SPEAKER_04 37:59

100%.

SPEAKER_01 38:00

Yeah, so that was 21. Uh you did beaver flat. Did you have a terrible recovery after that one too? Or I guess you had to do Iron Horse, but after that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 38:09

And you weren't I I remember the the again, like most of your guests said, it's it's uh a humbling course because it's different than now I've done a few mountain ultras and different 50ks and that constant punchy up, punchy down at beaver flat. Yes, I remember left my quads shredded. So I think I put very little running in between the two races, but I think it it helped me uh build a little bit of strength to maybe even improve that iron horse. And I've been doing that combo now for a few years, beaver flat iron horse, and they're usually two, three weeks apart at most.

SPEAKER_01 38:53

Yeah, it's cool. I've um been reading a little bit lately just um how how good that is actually to get like a big stimulus, like maybe not quite that close to a race, but like you know, that four to eight weeks before. Whereas I've heard things like before where it was like, oh no, just kind of stick to your training, don't overdo it, just build up slow. But it also seems like people who do do that big stimulus kind of a few weeks before also have success.

SPEAKER_04 39:15

So yeah. It taught me beaver flat that year, taught me my biggest lesson when it comes to electrolytes.

SPEAKER_01 39:22

Okay, yeah, yeah. I also learned the electrolyte lesson that year.

SPEAKER_04 39:26

Yeah, it was it's a tough lesson because I thought I was consuming enough water, and I actually swung to the other extreme where I was oversalting. Okay, yeah, yeah. I think I consumed I was on the on the course for more than 10 hours, right? Um, I look at my fuel or my hydration intake between electrolyte drinks and water. I think I consumed 12, 14 liters. Oh, geez. And I usually am a heavy sweater, right? So I my my water intake is on the high end, but at that time I'm I was worried about cramping, and I was cramping like hell, right? Um, but I remember I'm like, well, okay, it's soft, like we can just take more, take more, take more. But I think one of my friends ended up using the analogy that uh I pickled my stomach with any of the water that was taken, it was just coming out, and I wasn't absorbing it, absorbing it effectively. So that was a lesson learned the hard way, but you you can't over over-electrolyte.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

Yeah. Have you found as you've gotten stronger and fitter that cramps aren't as big of an issue, or do you think you just know how to manage it better? I kind of have the same thing where that year I was horrible cramps, and then I I do, I I do take electrolytes now, but I wonder how much of it even has to do with just, you know, maybe the fitness wasn't quite where it needed to be. Like that's some I'm sure that's how I was, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 40:48

Like fitness is is a big part of it too. And as as you kind of make all the mistakes on all the ultras and and you learn, I think one of the skills that I that you develop after a while is kind of riding that line uh where you're pushing yourself enough where it feels like you're gonna cramp, but you know that's right for that hairline push, and you're like, okay, if I stay right below that threshold, I can feel the muscle wanting to talk, but yep, it's definitely that that muscle strength part of it too. Electrolyte is important and all, but yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 41:23

And I'm I'm sure it's different for everyone too, but that's that's kind of my experience for sure. The Trail Running Film Festival is coming to both Taskatoon and Regina in 2026. The Taskatoon event will take place at the Capitol Club on Thursday, April 2nd. Tickets are available at outofbounds.ca with all proceeds going to the prairie run through. This festival is brought to you by Out of Bounds, Solomon, Prairie Running Crew, and Joggers and Loggers. The Regina event will take place Friday, May 1st at the Art Tutan on 13th Avenue. Tickets are available at Zone 4 under Regina Trailrunning Film Festival. The Regina Festival is brought to you by Regina Trailrunner, Putin Howell, Sweaty Yeti, Pasquapuit, Prairie Sky Running, and the Saskatchewan Podcast. We hope to see you all there. So what did you um after 2021? How long did it take you after Iron Horse to kind of figure out your 2022 season?

SPEAKER_04 42:29

I think I was very excited still. Um and I was just jumping at any race that I can uh get my my hands on. Um so that year, kind of that lull after in in October, November, where you're trying to figure out what races. Races at that point um in 2021, and it's it's getting, in my opinion, worser and worser, but a lot of races are opening up their registration so early, right? That's right, yeah. And you're trying to figure out your season, you're kind of still racing. Um but 2022 was still again a bit of uncertainty what's happening, what's what what what events are are going ahead, and there's some still COVID cancellations here and there. But um I managed to convince a colleague of mine to kind of pick up running, and um he kind of got into it 2020, 2021 and dealt with a couple of injuries, but um he found a race out in the mountains um out in Fernie. Okay, cool. The Elk Valley Ultra and convinced me to sign up for it, of course, because my rubber arm and we're supposed to do it together, right? And at that point, like the first couple of years of my running, I've I have not done a truly mountain race. Like I've done some beaver flat and like there's tons of elevation gain and and loss, but it's not a mountain race like. And and this was gonna be my first crack at it. Um I'd also had my deferral from Golden 22. So I'm like, okay, that's gonna be a good setup. Get my my mountain legs under me and then see how golden does, right? Um it up going out to uh to the Elk Valley Ultra in Ferny. Um again, great smaller scale event, I think the capacity maybe 150, maybe 200 people. Okay. Um it's it's a beautiful, stunning course. Um Fernie is just for for listeners that maybe don't know uh that area, it's just west of uh Crozness Pass, uh past forward. Um and that race is a point-to-point where you kind of start from from the town itself, you go up uh Mount Fernie, okay, you end up uh riding through the provincial park and then um doing one loop at the end around the the ski hill, right? And again, uh my my lack of experience in running, uh I read the numbers, uh it had an elevation gain of 28, 2700, which in my head I'm like, well, that's not far from beaver flat. And and I manage beaver flat. I should be fine, and I'm learning and all that. But uh you've probably heard it too, like from runners. One of the biggest tips don't try something new on race day. Yeah, that's right. Something new at that race, and uh running poles, right? Um I again that course humbles humbled me. Uh the first seven or eight K has a total gain of 1500 meters. Okay, yeah, yeah. I never experienced uh such a stretch of a climb. Um and I'm learning to trying to learn how to use my poles and struggle quite a bit and uh tick that one off. Uh learned that I I still have a lot to learn about mountain running and constant climbs. And I I do okay for downhill, um, but my my my climb climbing wasn't my forte. So I decided to um defer golden for for another year and try to get better at like shorter distances and um life was happening as well. 2022, I started a new job and um was trying to keep it called a little bit local. So after the Fernie race, the Elk Valley, I took a stab at uh road half marathon, uh, ran the Edmonton half, put up a decent time, uh, went back to Beaver Flat, improved my time, still cramped, like no one's business. Shaved an hour and a bit off my time, um, ran step up here in Saskatoon. Um, if you're familiar with that race, the step up for mental health uh event, uh in between beaver flat and and uh and iron horse. And again, it was another year where my goal was to get better at at ultras and that 100k distance. So I had a goal uh at Iron Horse that I needed to beat. And my deal that I made with with uh with my friends and Monique, I'm like, if I if I don't hit that target, I'm gonna have to come back and run Iron Horse because I keep saying it. Um and if I uh if I do it, I'm never going back. Like if I get my time, I'm done with Iron Horse, right? Yeah. Learned the value of having a race plan at that event that year. And uh I had uh I had just actually moved at that point to Saskatoon, met the running community here, um, met a bunch of wonderful people. Um in one of our training runs, uh, I met this uh new friend Charlotte Burkleben, and um we clicked along. She's she's an amazing accomplished runner, by the way. Plug for your podcast, you gotta have her on. Excuse me. Um but my my race plan was heavily dependent on my crew because one of the things that I've learned also is that I struggle with uh sleep deprivation at running event. I really need that pacer. So when I was adventure, no pacer, that's kind of my biggest uh uh obstacles. So I had met Charlotte that year um at a training run, and I think two, three weeks before the race, my uh my pacer plan basically disappeared. My my crew had COVID and I left with uh with no pacer. So thankful to the running community. I posted on our group chat, hey, I'm in need of a pacer. Anyone want to volunteer? And Charlotte at the time uh was living actually in Yellowknife, and it just happened that she was gonna be in Saskatoon and around the area um for the same date for that race. And on a whim, she jumped in and paced me for 40k. And uh and again, I'm thankful because I got in five minutes under my target goal. So okay, yeah, yeah. Nice. Oh year over year kind of building using Iron Horse as my my my goal to to measure how if I improved or if I learned anything over the year.

SPEAKER_01 49:35

Yeah, for sure. And you were still still improving then. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And then the next year, what did you get up to?

SPEAKER_04 49:46

2023 was again another uh like I keep saying, I I yeah I'm learning year uh over year. Um again, you get that lull um toward the end of the year. I actually remember driving to Iron Horse, and I was talking to Megan um because we were talking about already next year, and some of the events started opening registration. Sinister have and I haven't been to Sinister at that point, but registration opened the same day the Iron Horse race was happening. Okay. We were chit-chatting and oh, who's going, what distance, yada yada, yada. And um I basically told Megan, I don't know, surprise me. Just get me a ticket because I was worried and sell out. Um, I think the conversation went something like, uh, which distance, 50k or 50 mile? Or I think the price difference is like$10 or$15. I'm like, of course the 50 mile. I'm like, get more for your$53 buck, right? Not putting too much thought into it. So my my goal for 2023, call it that I maybe achieved what I wanted for the 100k, was to um focus on getting faster now. And I wanted to target smaller races or shorter races and see if I can maybe get that fast gear. Okay, yeah, yeah. Again, learned a lot that year because I bit way more than I should have. Um I think I ended up running 10, 12 events that year. Oh wow. From like 10k to 50k and 50 millimeter, but I kind of jammed my summer where I was running between training and running an event, I was racing or putting on 50k every two weeks. Oh wow, yeah, yeah. That took a toll of my body, and midway into uh 2023, I ended up um having uh a knee injury where overuse injury, yeah, where I could not really run for more than 5k. Oh wow. Actually, at at Fernie during that race, where to me what the typically the part that I'm good at, the downhill, um I I think that the that point would have been 5k to the finish line. So you're done the big all the climbs and it's all downhill from there. That 5k down took me three plus hours. Oh geez. I was in with my knee. So break that that summer, um worked on my knee rehab, uh, worked with a physiotherapist here in Saskatoon. Uh Kim Frader with uh and she she's phenomenal. She again patched me up, helped me work on some of the weak spots. And uh that was the same year that I went back to Golden. Um went to Golden for the first time and experienced the stage race. And again, great event, and surprised myself by uh taking it easy and listening to people that know what they're doing. That's for sure. Go a long way. And uh and yeah, that the that was the stage event is is a different experience and different different beasts. Um that's the Trans Rockies who put that one on. That's right. Yeah, yeah. I think that year would have been the year they just took it over, but okay, for sure, yeah. Who don't crew was was the race organizers the the run the the year that I ran it. And again, it's it's a different beast. I don't know if you've played or dabbled with stage events.

SPEAKER_01 53:34

Um did the OAB run the run the rocks last year was uh the the three-day race. So yeah. Dabbled a little bit.

SPEAKER_04 53:42

It's a different setup and a different experience, right? Like when you're going all out in a in a race capacity, uh first day it's fine. Second day, you're like, ooh, depending on how much you put on the first day, right? Yeah. Third day kicked my butt.

SPEAKER_01 54:00

Yeah, it's uh I'd like to try it again, like maybe train specifically. I wasn't training for a stage race at the time, so wasn't really prepared for that three days of bashing. And I imagine that the golden one is the one where you climb that first day, right?

SPEAKER_04 54:14

That's right. Yeah, so that's a it looks easy on paper because yeah, it's longer, right? Like and again, my my ignorant self was like, wow, if I can run 5k flat at this time, I don't know, like double my time. Not double my time.

SPEAKER_01 54:32

No, yeah. Yeah, so many of us fall into that trap. Hey, you just take your 50k time times it by two and think that's your 100k time, but have to add another 70 or 80 percent to that usually, unless you're really good athlete.

SPEAKER_04 54:50

But I'm still learning, Jason. I'm still learning. I feel like we might event for anyone doing I'm definitely going back one of these years, maybe even next year. Uh nice. It's a great event, beautiful area. That uh um that day two when it's a 60k and decent elevation, but a big chunk of it you're running on the ridgeline in golden. If you know the area, then you're kind of surrounded by mountains. And yeah, um, that year was was great weather, clear skies, not too hot, not too cold, had a blast.

SPEAKER_01 55:24

Awesome. Yeah, so yeah, ver so maybe yeah, this year I'll do try the stage race again. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And then did you end up doing Iron Horse in 23 again, too?

SPEAKER_04 55:37

Or I think I think I think my pitfall, I went back to Iron Horse, I didn't do the hunting that year. Um, but again, my my curiosity got the best of me, where um a bunch of friends were putting together a team for um for Iron Horse, and they initially there there was four or five of them, I can't remember. I want to say four, and they wanted a fifth to join them to for each person to take a leg out of Iron Horse for the 100k. Um and my silly side was like, well, I've seen all that course already. I want to see something more, right? When you guys object to me, um you find another I'll find a fifth person, right? And then I'll be your the sixth member of the team, and I want to do the other three legs part of the hundred miler course, right? Because yeah, for sure. Um so I ended up going, did that, had fun, and uh I think that was my gateway into the the next level to the hundred mile uh um club and fascination. Everyone was like, yeah, this is just your training for a hundred miler, and I'm like, ooh, I'm not I'm not that crazy yet. And granted, the following year I was already attempting a hundred miler. Nice. Was iron horse your hundred miler then? Uh I didn't attempt it at Iron Horse. So, like every year, again, that lull in uh in the winter where I wasn't sure what I was gonna do the following year. Do I kind of focus on short faster or uh try to push the limit and push the distance? And 2024 landed where I was gonna push the distance. So yeah, nice. Uh I kind of looked around um Saskatchewan, Alberta, BC. Um, and still I like even my experience running mountain races, I I still felt weak on the climbs, like it's not my strongest suit. Um, I'm not much of a hiker, jealous of hikers that can just power like no one's business. Um, so I decided to maybe structure a plan to try to get better at um some managing some fatigue, but I wanted a race that had the least amount of elevation. Okay. My other pet peeve would with runs is I didn't want something um that has a loop or out and back. I hate that setup. My body needs that stimulation. So you're not a backyard ultra guy. No, not at all. I think that's a reason why I also don't like a treadmill. Yeah, fair enough. So I went and looked around and um it was a toss between Iron Horse or Lost Soul. Okay. Um Iron Horse, which you know very well, is is a flat course. It's not a whole lot of repetition, uh, except the one part of a one leg. And um but it has an aggressive cutoff time in in the grand scheme of 100 miles, right? Uh 27 hours. That year I decided instead of trying to go fast flat, uh, let's take advantage of Lost Soul. Lost Soul, not a whole lot of elevation. Yeah, it is loops, but um, it's got a generous cutoff, 33 hours. So that's where I landed that year, and I was gonna attempt Lost Soul and put up a couple of like I didn't race a whole lot that year. I decided to cut back on the amount of racing and have more focused training. For sure, yeah. Um part of that training plan was uh attempting uh pseudo-stage race, if you want to call it a two-day event, squamish 50-50. Nice, yeah, yeah. Um I did that day one went well, day two not so well, but I took it conservatively too. Like I didn't wanna I think I was a bit gun shy from Baneary the previous year. Um I was again, squamish is a different beast, elevation is crazy, and uh um I was relying too much on my poles that race, you're not allowed to use a poles. So right, yeah, yeah. I started feeling it on on day two and the climbs, so I decided to to be conservative and I DNF'd day two. Um, all with the goal to go to to go into Lost Soul healthy. Unfortunately, Lost Soul did not go so well. Um 2024 was a hot year at Lost Soul. Um, I think, I don't know if it's true or not, but it was probably one of their hottest uh events for heat back to back. Okay. I heard from friends that usually it's day one is hot, day two is a little bit better, or they get rain, or or vice versa. Right? Um the year that I did it, it was just hot the whole time. Um managed the heat well, day one. Um I was kind of leaning heavily also on Megan, who had just finished Lost Soul the previous year. Okay. She came out, uh, she was like she was she crewed slash uh paced me as well. But uh day two between the sleep deprivation, the tiredness, um, that temperature dip, even though it wasn't extreme, but I think it was like something 35, 36, maybe even close to the valley to nighttime, dropping to like 10 degrees, and then the heat hitting up the the next day, my body could not adjust and uh which you look back at it, uh probably could have slugged my way to the finish. I think I had seven or eight hours to finish 30 more K, but my body had nothing left at that point.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:47

Yeah, so you made it about 130K then. 130k, yeah, that's impressive.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:53

To the ball diamond, and I remember Megan trying to push me, and you know, like she's an experienced runner as well, and she's done the course, and we had a rule that uh you can't quit on the first time you decide to quit, right? So the game we were playing is like, okay, I'm done, I can't do anymore. She's like, okay, I think it was something like one more climb, right? Or maybe I think we started by like, let's get to the eight station. I'm like, okay, fine, let's let's at least DNF at an eighth station. And we kept going a little bit more, and I'm like, no, I I just can't do it, right? And she's like, okay, next, like just one more climb, right? And I think my third ask when she was like, yeah, let's pack it in.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:35

We're done. Yeah, you were you were finished. Do you ever uh hope to try that one again?

SPEAKER_04 1:02:44

Uh probably not top of my list. Okay. One of the best, probably eight stations and well-organized events. The loops are not for me. Yeah, no, fair enough. Yeah. And for the hundred at that point, I've already seen the course twice. I'm like, I'm good at speeding up.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:00

Yeah, you do it three times, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:03:02

When you do the and then an extra times on a ball, each loop is 50k. So you that's right, yeah. And then you add 10 or 12k to to round it up.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:13

I did the 100k there. It must have been in 23 because it was a cooler year, and then uh Harold Litzenberger, good Saskatchewan runner, he was doing the 100 mile, and I remember I finished at I don't know, three in the morning, and then I was able to go shower and had some nachos and cheese and a big halt from 7-Eleven. Then I went back at like 11, and he was just like, I feel like he had one loop left or something, and I was just dumbfounded how he kept going all for that extra eight or nine hours while I was sleeping. And I made a joke about it, but he didn't think it was funny. Probably not at the time it's one of those things.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:46

I think we appreciate it later.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:48

Yeah, for sure. But that left uh a little bit of uh, you know, I've heard you talk about like DNFing at Sinister and like that that DNF stings a little bit, especially when it was kind of your big goal that year. So um probably not wisely. I decided to attempt another hundred mile a month later. Uh back to Iron Horse. Yeah, okay. Um which was again uh Monique enjoyed my my getting my email last minute tape when I get into the race and uh got a chuckle at it. But um uh that that's another event where I also learned another attempt where I learned that fueling was good, hydration was good, felt strong and healthy, and I was really ahead of even my um my race plan. But the as Megan calls it, the sleep monsters got the best of me. Uh oh. I ended up having to actually take a couple of dirt nabs at that event and trying to rally, but I ended up finishing the event, finishing the distance, but I was well over the the cutoff line, cutoff time.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:02

Okay, yeah, well that was awesome that you finished.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:05

Yeah. I think everyone had packed in at that point, and even the um because I made made it through Happy Hill before the last the cutoff time. Oh, okay, sure. Yeah. Um I think that was the quickest pit stop I've ever got in, I think in and out of aid station in three minutes. Yep. But uh I just death marked too much to the finish line, and I think I was two hours over the limit. I mean already blacked the arc and everything, but celebrated and yeah, it was it was it was a learning year 2024.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:39

Well, that's awesome. You tried again a month after sin. I was still sure I was never gonna run again. So you're you're more resilient than me.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:46

Oh, believe me, I I had that. It was I think I'm pretty sure I made the decision a week or maybe 10 days before Iron Horse to give it another goal.

unknown 1:05:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:58

Yeah, for sure. That your um lost soul was that your only DNF you've had, or if you've had other one?

SPEAKER_04 1:06:05

I had a couple of DNFs, but that was the one that stung because it was the goal race. That's right, yeah. Right. I've DNF'd for like other minor injuries here and there, or like Squamish, not wanting to maybe cause injury. I knew that I could finish, I just didn't want to risk it because I had a bigger goal, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:24

Okay. So at Squamish, you finished the first day and then called it on the second day. That's right. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:31

I'm again, I think I'm funny sometimes. My friends would have heard that line, but I coined the term Squamish 5025 because the next day.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:41

Yeah, that's all right. That's what I call my sin, the sin seven eighty three kilometer.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:47

That's there you go.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:49

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:50

And then uh he doesn't give a hat for that one.

unknown 1:06:53

Nope.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:54

I've come to accept that I guess I did a 50 mile early, so that's good. Although I think the 50 mile actual course might be harder than what I did, but but I digress. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. And then what did you get up to? I guess we're already up to last year, 2025, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:13

Yeah, last year 2025, where again I I started the year on probably the wrong foot. Um I signed up for Black Canyon, which you and I were talking about earlier. It's it's a difficult race to try uh to trade for like a winter ultra.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:32

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:33

My buddy had signed up for it the year before and and did it in 24. That was the year that we had a brown Christmas. So his training was phenomenal that year. Uh 2025 was a different year. Um, I got I call it I got suckered into signing up, but that year we had horrible freeze thaw cycle. You try to maintain your long runs and maintain fitness from from like all my fall races through the winter was was a challenge. Um found out later that I also was having a little bit of uh health issues and um maybe more common with uh long distance runners, but I was dealing with um anemia that as well. I found out found out after the race, but Black Canyon we went in and it was uh probably minus 40, 45 degrees here in South Virginia. Yeah, um Phoenix had probably uh one of the hottest Februaries that year, and we went from minus 45 to plus 30, plus 35 degrees. The body did not adjust very well, and I ended up actually DNFing at that race. Uh great event, it's a net downhill course, uh golden ticket uh race. So yeah, it's uh lots of really well it put together and organized, and you see all the big names uh in the trail community out there. So that that experience was great. But also I was I was on track on setting a very dangerous trend because if you look at the last counting Black Canyon, the last three or four races, it was a DNF at Squawish, a DNF at Lostville, horse and and a DNF, and I was reaching that DNF funk that year, which wasn't wasn't great.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:42

And do you think that looking back now, was that just uh from being anemic a little bit, do you think, or were there other factors as well?

SPEAKER_04 1:09:49

I guess I'm pretty sure that the heat I think I had a heat stroke or heat exhaustion. Okay. How far did you make it in? Oh, sorry. Okay, yeah. I made it to the 50k mark, but yeah, was feeling great and setting good time, and then all of a sudden, I think in in a span of five, ten minutes, consumed some calories, had some water, and my body shut down as well. So I don't know if it's the heat, the exposure, the I ran out of water because I I couldn't calculate between miles to kilometers. That's that's a different story. Yep. Um, I think it was a combination of errors. Maybe the anemia played part of it in it. Um maybe not, but it lit a fire in me because that year um there was a group of us that went from Saskatoon and um kind of made it into a mini trip, mini vacation, if you may. Um it was one of my friends' first time attempting a hundred K distance. So yeah, I didn't end up uh having to DNF at the 50K. Um, but fortunately, I think it took me four or five hours until I felt pseudo like myself and thought, hey, I'll I'll go death march with her, the last 10K, because you know, like pulling back from my personal experience at 100k distance, I'm like, gosh, she's gonna be probably slow. She'll appreciate the company, right? So ended up jumping in with her, and she was the beast. Uh she she kept me on my toes and like pushed the entire five 10 or 12k that ended up doing with her. Uh nice, that's awesome. And yeah, she she walked her finished. So it was overall a great experience, great, great event, um, and which kind of let me hungry, and I still need to go back for that 100k finish.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:43

For sure. And then last year when you were DNF Black Canyon, were you already signed up for the Sin 700 Miler?

SPEAKER_04 1:11:52

Or was that uh I don't think I changed my mind at that point yet? I knew that I need uh I needed a legitimate 100 mile finish, if you may, right? Yeah, I I needed to get in under an official finish time. So um talking to friends, talking to Megan, who you've had on the podcast, and you know that she she was playing around what what to do that year, and I think around February, um we're all talking and trying to figure out what to do. And I I think I mentally made the note that yes, I'm gonna attempt Sinister, set up my training plan to do that. A bunch of us from Saskatoon signed up to do Sinister as well. I don't think I actually bought my ticket or my my bib until a month before the race.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:39

Yeah, it's weird. You don't that's one race you could just kind of sign up in the spring or summer.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:45

Yeah, yeah. I I maybe I needed the mental preparation plus um needed to get some mileage under me. Last year, I think our our again, because we had a solid group that was training, some of them were doing the the triple, a few people were doing um the 100 miler at sinister. So we had a uh a core group that we put on some some good training runs, good training trips. Uh we've attempted things like the the Goggin Challenge that Megan put on uh together and all of those little things added up.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:23

And uh you did that overnight challenge at Sass Landing in when was that June? Bunch of you did that, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:31

Uh Jeff and and Mandy messaged me out of the blue as uh as again we're heavy into the training season, and they're like, What are you doing this weekend? I'm like, Well, I don't know, probably some sort of a long run training, right? Um it didn't take too long for uh for Jeff to convince me to come to to finish work, drive all the way to Sask Landing, shelf some food in in our mouths. It rained like it poured uh just before the run. And we ended up yeah, starting to run at 9 p.m. and we ran through the night.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:06

Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I was in Waterton that weekend, so I couldn't make it. But pretty good consolation prize.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:13

Oh, 100% more confident on my on my bucket list. But yeah, for sure. So what sorry if anyone has the ability to do that uh be a flat at night, uh it's a stunning course and a different challenge at night when you've got that steep downhill and you can't see.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:31

Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah, it's very nice and quiet out there too at night. Well, it's quiet out there all the time, but so you obviously dialed in your training pretty pretty well last year because you finished sin under the cutoff. And while accounts had a great race, so what did you change anything or what what what did you do to get get so awesome at 100 milers all of a sudden?

SPEAKER_04 1:14:54

Awesome as a stretch, like I keep saying, and I still feel like I'm I'm learning, and Sinister did not go without hiccups, but uh I think it's a combination of like what I've learned from having a coach like Shane, looking at other people and what they've like people like Mandy and Fleming and people that I look up to, uh uh people like Ross Thompson out in Lloyd. Like he's been at it, he's not gonna like what I say, but he's probably been at these events 30 plus years, so nice, very well experienced and disciplined. So I looked at what they're doing right and and try to pull bits and pieces, working with the group that was all attempting uh uh Sinister and the triple this year. And we just put together focused on things like uh strength training, which you heard me before the podcast complain about because it's not what you're doing. Um did a lot of Hills training. I put a silly little group uh on Tuesdays and Thursdays that uh no structure, no particular plan, but one of us or someone will put up a post saying, hey, I'm I'm doing a speed workout, or we're doing hilt training on that day, and we would just alternate and and it's slowly but surely kind of uh adding that that volume and uh and uh strength and and and and climbing experience that maybe helped me perform okay at at Sinister.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:22

For sure, yeah. I think and I think anybody who finishes Sinister, it's uh I don't I don't know, it's a it's a it's a real accomplishment for sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:31

Yeah, that was definitely a wild ride and and uh felt strong pretty much the entire race, and you know, at any of those events you you hit the lows and the highs. Um I think at leg six, starting leg six, I was uh the sleep demons were coming out from okay, and I was like at my worst when I'm running, I actually fall asleep moving. Oh, Jesus. Yeah, especially at a mountain race or even at any race, right? Like you don't want to fall off the trail. Um and yeah, you know, went into Sinister with a particular plan and a pace plan, and and I was holding steady, but at that point I was slowing down enough that not that the cutoff was fleeting, but the my overall goal that I had in mind was was slipping away from me. So met a person, you know, you meet these trail uh fairies, if you want to call them. The person that I needed to at that at that point, we chit-chatted about life, and he's one of those people that you know you leapfrog the entire race back and forth. Right. Uh ended up meeting him. He caught up to me. Uh, we chit-chatted a little bit, and he must have said the right things to light a fire under me. And I remember like powering through like six uh all the way to the top. I think I pushed a little too much. Okay. Where I overfatigued my one of my muscles, and things were getting out of alignment, and my knee locked up on me quite bad. Okay. But at that point, you know, I had already made it to the top of six. I was starting to climb down, and um I think my my splits on the climb were faster than my splits on the descent. Oh, geez. Was lucky enough again, one of my other friends caught up to me, um, end of leg six, and him and I kind of took it all the way through leg seven and and pushed me to the finish. But again, I made it just under the cutoff with five minutes or 30 minutes to spare.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:57

So that's awesome. How uh much time did you have left to finish when you started leg seven?

SPEAKER_04 1:19:06

I want to say close to two and a half, three hours. Okay, so you were pretty confident that you can I think I had to finish like because the pain too, like I was moving slow and it got worse. Like I can at that point I can climb fine, right? So, but anytime I went downhill, my knee just locked on me. So uh the start of leg seven, I was actually moving quite quite well because you go up a little bit, right? And then um after that uh quad trail, you end up going back into the single track and it's downhill basically to the finish. So climbing to that point, I I looked at my time and I don't remember exactly how much it was that I had left, but it looked like I had a generous amount, but then as I was coming down, I was slowing even further on the downhill, which is again usually my my strength. So I think the last six, seven K I ran and I was maybe grunting the whole time in pain. But we had to all pick it up toward the end.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:10

Yeah, but you got it done. Yeah, that's frustrating. I know at Blackspur in I think 2022, I I would say I blew an ass muscle and I couldn't uh run downhill for like the middle 30k, and it was so frustrating. There was like this five kilometer stretch of gravel where you could just bomb down it, but I could not run downhill, and I swear to God past, but like it felt like 3,000 people. It was so annoying. Then then it loosened off and I was fine the last 10k. But yeah, that's a that's a gross feeling 100%.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:37

And sinisters, you know, it's it's one of those races that I could not you can't with the cutoff and the elevation and just the trains you get through and the conditions, it's it's a race that it doesn't feel like you have a whole lot of time to lolly gag, which is probably one of my favorite things to do on new events and new new races, but for sure. You felt like you're under the gun the whole time.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:01

Yeah, it's like uh it's a business trip, that one, hey. Just just there to get it done.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:07

100%.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:08

For sure. What do you have planned for the future?

SPEAKER_04 1:21:12

I think my um my lull kind of had expanded this year. I haven't made any plans or solid plans yet for for this year. Oh I was dealing with that anemia thing uh through actually all of last year. Um life stressors, worse work got busy on me too, toward the end of last year, and I think my body was feeling the stress. I ended up um just before Christmas, tearing a muscle. Oh no. So I was dealing with the rehab of that and trying to figure out what to do. Managed to still get a race early this year. Um, went back to Black Canyon, not like what I wanted, not to do the 100k, but ticked off to 50k and had a good time. It felt good being able to recover post injury and um and be able to still put on a race, but I haven't made up my mind yet on what I'm doing.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:14

Yeah, for sure. Was that uh was it hot again in at Black Canyon? No, this year is a lot better.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:20

It was nice. It was a nice you and I were chatting uh back and forth over text, but this was probably one of the nicest runs or races that I've done. Oh, nice. I was just recovering from an injury and had not a whole lot of expectation, went in just wanting to finish and feel good and not pressure for time or cutoff or anything like that. And the first 10k, my mind was kind of locked into making sure that I don't make the injury worse, or if I push a tingle or something to dial back. But weather was great, and it's a net downhill, which again plays to my strength and ended up having a blast of that event.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:04

Awesome. That's great. So then the rest of the year you're just kind of keeping it open for now.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:10

Keeping it open for now. We'll see. I my rubber arm might get uh twisted very quick here.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:16

Yeah, you could probably pencil an iron horse for sure, I bet.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:21

That's more more tradition than than uh than an event at this point, but probably the beaver flat, likely racer, those kind of things. Yep, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:31

Well, that's awesome. And then you uh do a little bit of work with the uh one of the group runs out there in Saskatoon as well, don't you? Like the loggers and joggers.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:39

I do. Uh it's uh it's a group that I can't take credit for. Um like you heard me earlier talk about Lloyd and what I what I really enjoyed about getting to know the running community and running group and what it's done for me open up. Um experiences have moved around quite a bit. So I found the running community not just for running, but we ended up building relationships and you find people with common interests, uh, even careers sometimes, right? And you form great relationships. So when I moved back to Saskatoon um in 2021, um Brain Sport at that point had um stopped the the group run um that they used to put on together. And I think pre-COVID, I've never been to one of those runs, but I hear they used to get people in the hundreds, right? And they had split and get organized. But for many reasons, COVID kind of stopped that, and then Brain Sport never picked it up again. Um there was a lot, there was a strong running community in Saskatoon, but again, I think post-COVID people got their own group and they were kind of running independently. Um moving to Saskatoon, I kind of found a gap and I couldn't find the community yet. Okay. Ended up connecting with great people. Um but um one of the local breweries at the time in Saskatoon um called Nine Mile had uh had a great program for their employees where if you've got interest into something, if you want to do a special event, special night, go at it, right? Um and uh a girl named Erin Sowatsky had started a cross-country ski club um the previous year, or maybe that same year, and um she wanted to extend that because she they had success and it was a good way for the community to get together and do something active. Um so she started the what was called the Nine Mile Run uh Run Club at the time. Okay, cool. It was her first year also attempting Beaver Flat. We keep going back to Beaver Flat, but she had a drinking game.

unknown 1:25:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:26:00

Signed up for Beaver Flat and wanted to uh um kind of train for it as well. So that group started with her and she grew it throughout that year, and then nine mile ended up changing locations and they were kind of evolving their business. So um the following year where we're kind of I call it the homeless year, where we were just kind of all over the place and trying different places in in Saskatoon to and and then we lost the our home, Nine Mile, so we pivoted to joggers and loggers. And okay. It's a group that we meet every Wednesday right now, and um I've kind of taken more of an active role. I I hate to take ownership or or uh claim it as mine, but there's a a bunch of people that help uh make the group kind of organized, and like Megan, for example, is helping with social media, and um we get together once a week, every Wednesday. Um we've got a run group, a walk group, uh you do a trail run, and and at the same time we break off, people can stay on pavement. We do a loop around Saskatoon, around the river, um, anywhere from 5 to 9K. And then we get back together for uh for a social visit. That sounds awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:24

Yeah, yeah, that's really good. And then I noticed you're also part of bringing the trail running film festival, the Saskatoon kind of sprung up suddenly, which is awesome. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:35

That was uh yeah, I can't take credit for it. Um we're we're helping joggers and loggers is helping with this as well. Okay, nice. There's there's a a good trail running community in Saskatoon, but I don't think there's a a hold for all of us. There's a lot of people that run across uh the province, but uh we've got a good representation in uh joggers and loggers and um Jeff Curry. Without a bound, uh we actually it started all as us being jealous of you guys because you guys are hosting it and we were exchanging a few messages with a few people like oh this should be a road trip and we should go all down and and like spend the day and then it'll be good to meet a whole lot of uh people uh from the community there. And Jeff got excited and he's uh he's a go-getter, and uh he phoned me at the start of the week on a Monday, and he's like, What do you think about this and that? and we uh we worked I I I can't even say it we work together. Like I I gave him support and say, hey, we'll do whatever is needed. Sounds like a great idea, and Jeff pulled it all together um to get it organized for next month. So give him all the kudos, we'll we'll be out there and it'll be a great, great uh community night for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:50

Yeah, how do you know how ticket sales are going?

SPEAKER_04 1:28:54

I don't like uninvolved, and Jeff has has been a rock star. Um we're um I think they're I don't know how I don't know a whole lot about how different cities host the uh the event, but um to me the tickets are reasonable, it's a great uh great location here in in town at uh Capitol. But uh we also partnered up with uh Prairie Run Crew and uh they uh so we've got a specific target that we got ahead just to break even and cover it. And all any proceeds above and beyond that is all going to support prairie run crew. Yeah, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:36

That's really good. And do you know the date off the top of your head? Uh April 2nd. April 2nd, nice, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's kind of cool how I don't I don't know if the film fest has ever been in Saskatchewan. It was in Lloyd Minister a few years ago, right? It was in Lloyd Minister, I think the group hosts this every year, and I ended up racing for the last two, three years now, and that weekend, so I've never made it out there, but uh I know they've they've hosted it.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:03

I don't know if they counted it on Alberta or Saskatchewan.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:05

Yeah, I was wondering about that, but there's for sure two, if not three in Saskatchewan now, so that's pretty awesome. Yeah, ours also came around really suddenly too. Just uh one of the leaders was like, hey, we should do this, and then made a little committee, and a few days later the place was booked. And I I had thought of doing it a couple years or maybe last year for sure. And I always had this dream of doing like uh you know one in Davidson or something, so the halfway between Regina and Saskatoon, but then I then I decided that would just be annoying for everyone, so it'd be best if everyone just did it in their own city. For sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:36

We should just uh convince the Dudar brothers to make an event around it and that's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:42

Yeah, well, that's awesome. Was there anything else we wanted to chat about, or do you think we got it all covered?

SPEAKER_04 1:30:48

I think we covered quite a bit. Appreciate you keeping me on track. Um I think uh maybe my parting words here just as uh I I still consider myself flirting into the whole running and running journey. Um I hear a lot of a few people make comments about even joining us on the on the run group and feeling intimidated or uh or uh not fast enough and and uh all of that stuff. I think I I think just give it a go if that's something that interests you and and stick with it. Um you've heard my kind of journey and all the dumb decisions that I've made along the way, and um one by one it gets it gets easier and better over time, but yeah, for sure. It's it's a great community and a great bunch of people and um not as intimidating as some may make it.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:42

Yeah, I don't really know of anybody who right from the first place person to the last place person who's not awesome or or a first place person who would not appreciate everybody in the race, like and any elite athletes that I know anyway. They don't care if they're just pleased you're out there or like happy to help. 100%. Yeah, they're just they know you're out there challenging yourself and taking part, and that's all that matters. For sure. 100%. All right. Well, I guess we might as well leave it there, and maybe we'll uh well I know we'll see each other at some point this summer, but it's been been a great chat.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:16

Appreciate that, Jason. Thanks, and thanks for what you're doing with the podcast.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:20

Oh, no problem. Thanks for being a loyal listener. I appreciate it. Thank you. All right, bye-bye. You have been listening to the Saskatchewan podcast. Please subscribe and leave a review wherever you listen to pods, and remember to get in touch at jasontburns40 at gmail.com for suggestions of who you think may make a great guest on this podcast, or for comments in general. And as always, thanks to this wonderful Canadian band, The Burning Hell, for the use of its song Holidaymaker. Check them out at theburninghell.com. And until next time, keep putting in the work.