Boardwalk Run

Chattahoochee River Ride

Walk to airport bus

Ski Squats

First ultra! Solo, unsupported. Windom, Sunlight, N Eolus, and Eolus Peak. Pretty excited to sit down for the first time since 4:30am. Fun scrambling, though I wasn’t efficient with the route-finding on Sunlight or Eolus. Perfect weather. Reeeeeally long approach. Crazy blisters. IT band unhappy again. Nearly fell asleep a few times once it got dark at 7pm and still had a few miles to go. I’d thought the route was just under 40 miles — the last mile was wildly demoralizing.

I don’t think I realized how mentally challenging it would be to be in the mountains alone for this many hours. Not many people out here so late in the season (I saw only 3 people between the TH and all the summits), so it felt a lot more remote and lonely than I’d expected. But overall, I’m really happy with how the day went.

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Trip report:
I woke up at 3am and started moving at 4:30am. I felt pretty stiff after driving ~7 hours the night before, and I'm not skilled at running in the dark, so the first few miles were a little uncoordinated. The trail from Purgatory down to the river was covered in fallen leaves, which made it slippery and trickier than it should've been.

After getting down to the Animas, the trail became comfortable and pleasant. It started getting light around 6:50am. A bit before arriving at Chicago Basin, I stopped to filter water. My filter was being extremely stubborn, and this cost about 10m for only 0.5L of water. I gave up, and set the filter up to soak in my vest while I kept moving.

I got up to Twin Lakes, then headed up Windom. It's straightforward to the summit, but was pretty snowy/icy, so it was a little slower than I expected. Saw the first two people I'd seen all day around here. Boulder-hopped over to the choss leading up to Sunlight. Once that turned to solid scrambling, I became really inefficient with route-finding though it was still fun. I lingered at the top for a few minutes before doing the jump off. Getting down the choss on Sunlight felt trickier than it should’ve been because I was tired -- I slipped at one point where I definitely shouldn't have.

Next was North Eolus, where I saw the third human of the day. I had an easy time finding my way to the summit, but my legs were on fire at this point. The catwalk over to Eolus was a fun time, but from there to the top, I took much longer route-finding than I should have and ended up on inefficient class 4-5 lines to the summit. This would've gone a lot faster if I'd been mentally fresh or had previewed the route. Easily stuck to class 3 on the scramble down, which went by quickly.

The run down from there was pleasant and fun. I stopped to filter water at the first stream below Twin Lakes. Thankfully, my filter was revived after soaking in my vest, and I chugged 0.5L immediately and filtered another  This stop took maybe 10m, but at least I got nearly 2L out of this one! Around this time, my IT band started giving me problems, so I took an NSAID with the water and crossed my fingers that I wouldn't give myself rhabdo.

The flats to the Needleton junction went relatively smoothly on the soft flat trails. I had to stop to put leukotape on a blister around here, which cost another 10m, but thankfully was resolved for the rest of the run.

The last couple of miles after the final bridge out were when the day got hard. It got dark at around 6:45pm, around mile 38, so I had to stop again to get out the headlamp. I saw glowing eyes in the dark, which morphed into deer as I approached. I politely asked them to please go away because they were creeping me out, but they didn't listen, and I had to just walk by. I started to fall half asleep while moving, and the IT bands were increasingly painful. I'd finished most of my liquid calories, and it was hard to eat while holding poles and running at the same time. I hadn't been closely monitoring my water, and I ran out after I got too high above the Animas to filter more. I tend to cough a lot while running at altitude, and after a long day of coughing, running out of water here was painful.

This was a physical challenge, but it was also wildly mental. I enjoyed the chance to push myself in the mountains for hours and to practice suffering well. It was special and rare to be on top of these remote 14ers with so few people out given how late we are in the season -- which added to the mental challenge. I'm excited for more women to tackle this route, and I'm excited to take what I've learned and do this again a little faster someday.

Gear:
Osprey Dyna 6L vest with 1.5L water bladder
Small running belt
New(ish) pair of La Sportiva Bushido II's
Petzl headlamp
Emergency wind layer
Emergency bivy
Water filter
Mini first aid kit
Garmin InReach
Mini sunscreen / chapstick
AirPods
BD lightweight gloves
BD trekking poles
Shorts, sun hoodie, hat, sunglasses

Fuel:
1.5L water
0.5L maple syrup + electrolyte mix in soft flasks
4 Stroopwafels
3 fig bars
1 Clif bar

Splits:
4:30am / 00:00 - Start
11:07am / 06:37 - Windom
12:24pm / 07:54 - Sunlight
2:04pm / 09:34 - N Eolus
2:37pm / 10:07 - Eolus
7:56pm / 15:26 - Finish
* Note: Splits are approximated based on my gpx file, as I did not record them in real time.



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Maddie Fortier

Chicago Basin 14ers

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