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Anna

@aecolini.bsky.social

Coming in September!

jaredbeasley.bsky.social @jaredbeasley.bsky.social · Mar 19

📚Book Announcement📚
Back at the Barkley firepit this year – and thrilled to announce THE ENDURANCE ARTIST is now available for pre-order! This rare look into Lazarus Lake will be published by 80/20 and distributed by Simon & Schuster. #BM100🔗bit.ly/3FuwNe5

April 7, 2025 at 11:54 AM

Reposted by Anna

Taka

@taka-does-stuff.bsky.social

Already a proper edited video on this year's Barkley! www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezjz... #BM100

The Barkley Strikes Back: 2025's Brutal Return to Form

YouTube video by Singletrack

www.youtube.com

March 24, 2025 at 10:12 PM

Reposted by Anna

Nicki Lygo

@drlygo.bsky.social

Barkley debrief from Laz 👌🏻

#BM100

Barkley debrief from Laz page 1

Lazarus Lake
4h • 0
barkley debriefing
to say the course won this year is an understatement. and since the smoke cleared,
revealing a battlefield littered with the corpses of hubris and overconfidence
i have been thinking back over the past year and especially the past week seeking to understand what went wrong...
and i came out with some definite opinions about what triggered the massacre of 2025. that doesn't mean i am right
but i think the cat ass trophies of 2025 can be greatly attributed to a few mistakes repeated by a lot of athletes.
sure, the course got tweaked. it gets tweaked every year.
and i knew going in that this was a difficult barkley course.
but, while it had a little more climb it was also shorter.
i was actually not certain we would not have another mass finish!
but in the leadup to the race i saw errors being committed that lowered my optimism for the field.
1) taking bad advice.
i saw it written over and over, until it took on a life of its own.
"follow a veteran"

Barkley debrief from Laz page 2

better to develop your own navigational skills. how do you know the veteran you follow did not become a veteran by following veterans?
and even if you latch on to someone with serious navigation skills
if they leave you out in the woods,
all that happened was that they led you a long way from safety
and the main thing you learned was what the right direction looks like
when someone's ass is in the middle of it!
2) take a picture of the map,
and retreat to your own tent to copy it.
that one is so stupid we arent even going to allow it next year.
first, it is going to be nearly impossible to mark the checkpoints accurately from a phone picture. if you make it small enough to see where the mark is, you cannot tell the exact location.
if you make it large enough to see the exact location, you cannot see enough of the whole map to see where it goes.
and exact placement of the checkpoint locations is critical!
second, what everyone lost was the discussion that normally goes on around the master map. following a veteran might be a fools errand. having them tell you what to look for when locating checkpoints
or selecting your routes
can be worth its weight in gold.
which gets back to navigation and the checkpoints.
i don't think the athletes realized how critical it is to: mark the checkpoints accurately navigate to them.

Barkley debrief from Laz page 3

great pains are taken to place the marks on the exact location of the checkpoint.
and i think many of the athletes with rudimentary navigation skills
are unable to look at the map and exactly visualize a location.
contour lines are not merely a record of elevation change.
they are a picture of how the ground is configured.
what i kept hearing was;
"i shot a bearing"
shooting a bearing is the most rudimentary form of navigation.
if it is not pitch black night, or white-out fog i would not use a compass to navigate at frozen head.
i would look at the map and match the contours with my surroundings.
then, instead of a straight line through all obstacles i would pick the best route to reach my destination. old trails and logging roads are easy to follow. in the absence of human-made routes
if you look at the contours for the "easiest" route you are almost certain to find game trails going the same way. animals always choose the easiest route to go from here to there,
that is how game trails are formed.
and game trails also take out a lot of the briars and undergrowth.
there is an additional benefit to following the contours. you know what the ground should look like as you approach the location.
we heard a lot of known excellent navigators comment that they passed clusters of virgins "turning over every rock"
nowhere near the next checkpoint.
no amount of searching will help if you cannot identify the checkpoint locations!

Barkley debrief from Laz page 4

3) trying to brute force error correction.
some people searched for checkpoints for as much as 5 hours,
going back and forth over the same ground. then came home with a description that did not sound like they were ever in the vicinity of the actual checkpoint!
checkpoints are not "hidden" they are not probably in plain sight,
and they have to be placed where hogs cannot get to them.
but the map markings and directions are intended to make them easy to locate.
in a race with zero margin for error,
i would not look more than 5 minutes before consulting the map.
find a nearby landmark that is easily identifiable. or even a couple of more distant peaks that you can see...
if these do not match what you should see from the checkpoint,
then you are searching in the wrong place!
my conclusion about the weekend is not that kind. but sometimes what you need to hear and what you want to hear are not the same.
barkley is out there on the edge of possibility. but it is not impossible.
for most athletes the 100 is not going to be in their future.
the best ability, preparation, and execution might not be enough.
but most of them should have been able to knock out one loop under the time limit!
the 2025 field left a lot of cards on the table.

March 22, 2025 at 7:36 AM

Reposted by Anna

John Sugden

@johnsug.bsky.social

this year was brutal -- looks like the fewest total loops completed (and average loops per runner) since 1995 #bm100

March 20, 2025 at 4:03 PM

Reposted by Anna

John Sugden

@johnsug.bsky.social

final tracker (more or less -- still don't know who was the tenth runner to complete the first loop) -- congrats on a fun time in Frozen Head, John Kelly! #bm100

March 20, 2025 at 3:31 PM

Reposted by Anna

Keith

@keithdunn.bsky.social

The 2025 Barkley Marathons is over. There are no finishers. #BM100

March 20, 2025 at 7:45 AM

Reposted by Anna

Keith

@keithdunn.bsky.social

John Kelly, who is credited with a Fun Run, tapped himself out, after which Sébastien Raichon was tapped out. Tomokazu Ihara is still on the course after 40 hours. #BM100

March 20, 2025 at 7:41 AM

Reposted by Anna

Keith

@keithdunn.bsky.social

We are 36 hours into the race, meaning the three runners still on Loop 3 cannot continue to Loop 4. However, if they complete Loop 3 within 40 hours they will be credited with a Fun Run. That’s where the real race is now. #BM100

March 20, 2025 at 3:37 AM

Reposted by Anna

John Sugden

@johnsug.bsky.social

more or less, how things look now #bm100

March 19, 2025 at 8:56 PM

Reposted by Anna

Shasta

@theshastaone.bsky.social

And then there were four. Tomokazu Ihara, John Kelly, Sébastien Raichon and Maxime Gauduin. Like the string ensemble on the Titanic, I will follow you until the bitter end 🫡 #bm100

March 19, 2025 at 6:23 PM

Reposted by Anna

Keith

@keithdunn.bsky.social

Whist many slept a few more runners have ended their run. Six runners remain on Loop 1. None of the runners who started Loop 2 have dropped or completed the loop. #BM100

March 19, 2025 at 11:45 AM

Reposted by Anna

John Sugden

@johnsug.bsky.social

the real march madness #bm100

March 19, 2025 at 11:04 AM

Reposted by Anna

Taka

@taka-does-stuff.bsky.social

My #bm100 spreadsheet has gained a tab for 2025! I remind you again that this is NOT a primary source. Just gathering online information into one place. docs.google.com/spreadsheets...