Mourning My Father With Ultra-Long-Distance Running

A million steps along a crooked path led me here

The author in 2014. Credit: Raven Eye Photography

A funny thing happens after you’ve been running long distances for a while. You begin to lose perspective. It happens so gradually that you barely notice, until the day when 12 miles seems like a “short” run. When a couple thousand vertical feet of gradual uphill running spread over 15 miles is “pretty flat.”

It’s human nature to adapt, to keep moving the mark and pushing your own thin edge. Whatever you do regularly becomes routine, no matter how extreme it may appear. Ultrarunning — any distance greater than a traditional 26.2-mile marathon — is no different. In the winter of 2014, I’d been running ultramarathons for two years. I’d run and won 50-kilometer and 50-mile races. So it made sense to try making the leap to 100 kilometers.

And at the same time, it made no sense at all.

The author crawling over the finish line of her first race in 1982; her mother in 1965; and her father in 1978. Credit: David L. Arnold

I never set out to be an ultrarunner. A million steps along a crooked path led me here…