“Never ask yourself why.” This is one of the original adage’s I heard after entering the sport of ultrarunning years ago. It was a dark, insider joke that meant don’t ask the question because you won’t be able to find a...
Articles by Buzz Burrell
Running is very egalitarian. If you practice then you get better—no special skill, equipment, age, gender, location or cost involved.Which is great news, except for one thing: you really do have to practice....
Seeing a photo of Gene Dykes standing on the podium next to Eliud Kipchoge got my attention. I have done things with world-class athletes from many sports, but this photo got my attention. Dykes had just won his age g...
Burrell finished the GranTrail Courmayeur 30K in Italy this summer at age 71. courtesy TORX One January morning many years ago, I did a 10k classic XC ski race, then the 15k open (skating) race and 2...
I used to train by running in one direction and when I got tired, I’d turn around and run back home. This simple plan guaranteed a good workout. One summer day, I left my home in Kalamazoo, Michigan, ran...
Everything in life is an adventure. Or at least, it should be. But there are differences – while road sub-ultrarunners never leave home without first starting their sport watch, trail runners almost always bring a cam...
I’ve been wanting to talk about safety for decades. After over 50 years of running (and skiing, climbing and paddling) in the backcountry, here is the full list of the disasters, injuries and near-death experiences I’...
I am entered in eight races over eight weeks this summer, most of them in the Alps. Seeing how I entered almost no running races over the past five years, friends are commenting that this is a very ambitious schedule (wh...
I am an expert on age and running. I wish I wasn’t. I wish I was 40 years old and knew nothing about this miserable topic. That was way more fun. But hold on, 40 years old is classified as “master” which was three d...
Half of these award-winning FKTs were done outside the US, which is great to see and something new for 2021. The FKT scene is very active all over the world, and our voters recognized that. There were some long rou...
Fastest Known Times (FKT) can easily be undertaken while maintaining a distance of six feet (or six miles, in some cases). Not only can runners skip the hassle of lotteries for the privilege of entering...
The Fastest Known Time of the Year Award is back again for its third year. FKTs are now a fundamental element of ultrarunning. From the best runners in the world to back-of-packers, runners are creating their own adventu...
The Most Notable FKTOYs is back for its second year. And with even more vigor: runners are really going after their personal projects. In June Cat Bradley won the prestigious Western States 100 race, then in November fin...
“Skimo” – the word is now part of the ultrarunning lexicon. Kilian Jornet has always done it. Many ultrarunners have taken it up, and Mike Foote and Rob Krar are on their National Teams. It’s the coolest new thing…should...
Outside Magazine recently headlined, “FKT is the new Podium,” noting the trend of “…world-class ultrarunners prioritizing racking up new FKTs instead of a podium” at a traditional ultramarathon. While many marathon runne...
In 2000 Peter Bakwin and I were going to set the record on the John Muir Trail. But we weren’t sure what the record was. No one was. This is hard to believe in the age of the Internet, where people all over the world...
At 4:18 a.m., Saturday, September 11, Andy Hamilton of Boulder jogged into the Longs Peak Ranger Station. He had climbed all 54 mountains in Colorado higher than 14,000 feet in 13 days, 22 hours, and 48 minutes. The “...