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Sri Chinmoy MT Blog USA
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Day 2
A hazy, overcast day turned nasty for an hour just after dinner time.The runners continued through 50 mile per hour gusts and a few sprinkles of rain.Asprihanal Aalto continued to lead with 67 miles today. Ananda Lahari Zuscin took day honors with 70.24 miles.He was the only runner over 70 miles today.He was moving well in the evening coolness
Asprihanal Aalto from Helsinki,Finland led the Day 1 charge from start to finish, completing 161 laps for a total of 88.35 miles in the first 18 hours of the 12th Annual Self-Transcendence 3100 Mile Race. Smarana Puntigam totalled 80.12 miles to move into second position. Suprabha Beckjord,52, from Washington,DC reached 66.4 miles, her best first day total in several years. The 14 starters enjoyed cooler evening temps and sea breezes after a hazy, sticky first morning. The journey continues at 600am.
June 15,2008-Day 1
At six o'clock this morning,a conch sounded and 14 runners galloped away from the starting line of a slightly more than half-mile city block in Jamaica, Queens,New York. This was the beginning of the 12th Annual Self-Transcendence 3100 Mile Race, an epic journey the equivalent of running from New York to San Francisco, with a side trip to Santa Barbara thrown in. The field included many of the world's best superlong distance specialists, including four-time winner Asprihanal Aalto from Helsinki,Finland, and eleven-time finisher Suprabha Beckjord of Washington,DC, the lone female entrant and distance runner deluxe. This group of runners boasts a total of 49 finishes among them, two-thirds of the all-time list of 73 performnaces. The race was dedicated to the memory of Sri Chinmoy (1931-2007), who founded not only this race but the Marathon Team that bears his name some 31 years ago.
Temperatures at the start were in the 70ºs with sticky humidity left over from thunderstorms and torrential rains the previous evening. The runners cover as many laps as possible during the hours of 600am to 12 midnight, pacing themselves and eating and drinking on the go. They receive massage and medical help when needed, and sleep in houses or apartments when the course is closed. Each lap is recorded and compiled at the race, as teams of volunteers help the runners with their needs.
The world best for 3100 miles is 41 days+08:16:29 by Madhupran Wolfgang Schwerk of Germany. Suprabha Beckjord holds the women's best at 49 days+14:30:54
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We have moved the web presence of the 3100 mile race to a new home at www.3100.ws. |
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Utpal covers the camp breakdown. |
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The finish by Utpal Marshall. |
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Here is Utpal's story for the last night on the course this year. |
(photo by Arpan) |
What can you say. Madhupran was all alone and still came up with the third best distance in a ten day period in history. Then there's John who fought off a concerted attack from Igor yesterday, found hom out on the course and basically stuck with him for the last 12 hours of the race. I guess he wanted to show him who was the boss. Ivana opened up the gap between her and Lenka in the last day and never looked back. Dipali had no competition. Kaneenika made it look easy. The rookie Petr Simicek squeaked by the rookie Purnasamarpan to capture seventh spot in the 6 day and get into the top 7 winners' circle. Alfia Olga Abramovskikh recaptured her lead over Svitlana Samarina in the last 2 days and captured the 4th position in the women's ten day. There was plenty of intense competition over the course of the ten days of this event. But I want to give the day's award and kudos to the rookie, Vladimir Razumofskiy, from Krasnodor, Russia. He found 67 miles within him for the final 24 hour period. I was in the 6-day counting tent with 237:48:39 on the race clock. In a 240 hour race that means we are just over 2 hours from the finish. Vladimir came up to us and sincerely asked Petr Spacil (the 6-day counter and 3,100 miler) if he could still do it. I looked at him and then at the board and immediately saw that he wanted to get to the 500 mile mark for the finish. He was at 282 laps at that point. I did not want to discourage him but it was obvious that he was not going to be able to run 18 miles in just over two hours after running full out for 10 days. He seemed to figure it out by himself but I was struck by his intensity and earnest desire to achieve his goal of 500 miles. He beat everyone else in the 10 day race that day and takes the top mile honors for the tenth day from all the way down in 18th place in the finals table. The 10 Day race Final Results: Men Women And the 6 Day: Men Women |
(photo by Arpan) |
Woo hoo! Top honors for the men's 10-day go to Glen Turner who turned on the juice last night. John Geesler in the 6-day briefly relinquished the lead to Igor Mudryk just before yesterday's 8 day split but put in the day's top overall performance at 72 miles and pulled back into the lead. Dipali Cunningham remains in commanding lead of the women's 6-day. Olga Abramovskikh took top honors in the women's 10 day race with 60 miles. Kaneenika Janakova is 30 miles out in front of the battle royal for 2nd place between Lenka Svecova and Ivana Nemcova who have been within 5 miles of each other for the entire 9 days. Day 9 of the 10 day race: Men Women Day 5 of the 6 day: Men Women |
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Utpal is trying to stay ahead of the runners. |
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More of Utpal's interviews and video . |
