Jim Gourley - The Race Within: Passion, Courage, and Sacrifice at the Ultraman Triathlon

Contents

Foreword by Hillary Biscay

I dont think one can race Ultraman and not emerge a changed person. Taking place in the home of the most historic Ironman event, Ultraman is at once a throwback to the golden days of Ironman and a new frontier in terms of pushing the limits of the human body through an ultra-distance triathlon stage race. It was for both of these reasons that I was drawn to this three-day, 320-mile challenge, and for these and more that I fell in love with the experience.

During my rookie year in 2010, there were momentsno, hoursduring which I was reduced to a state I had never before encountered in competition. Never before had I faced the challenge of hours of racing ahead of me when I was too tired to even extend my arm to grab the hydration and fuel on offer. Never before had I been expected to start a 52.4-mile foot race after a night when my body hurt so badly just to lie on a mattress that sleeping was out of the question. Yet somehow I made it throughI got to the finish line and even rose to the challenge when the race turned into a 10k sprint finish. I left having learned that I could push far past where I had previously been, both mentally and physically, yet hungry to return with a more bulletproof arsenal.

While triathlon is usually an individual sport, I learned during my first go in 2010 that one of the most unique benefits of the Ultraman experience is the team or family element ohana , they call it. I think because Ultraman is a no-frills, 320-mile test against oneself, it attracts a very special group of people; we go to Kona and meet others like ourselves when we may not encounter these kind of people very often in our daily lives.

I once heard a saying about what motivates endurance triathlon athletes: If you have to ask why, you will never know. In Kona we find 35 others who would never ask us why people like Mike Rouse, who celebrates every birthday by running his age in miles (this year is 62), and others like Gary Wang, for whom his annual pilgrimage to Kona is his time to meditate. They get it. We have an instant bond that intensifies with each day of shared suffering during the race.

What I did not anticipate was what an incredible bond the experience would create between my crew and me. It is a strange and somewhat uncomfortable feeling to be able to essentially call out orders and have a team of people there to meet them for more than three straight daysbut in Ultraman this team, the crew, becomes ones lifeline. I am now incredibly proud and honored to say that I have an Ultraman World Championship title to my name, but am well aware that without my amazing crew, this would not have been possible. And what I have now that is actually even more valuable that any trophy is the incomparable bond with my Ultraman ohana: Amy, Michael, Maik, Ian, Dave, and Marilyn. Every time I travel those island roads now, I think of these people and how grateful I am for their friendship. I am still overwhelmed by their team effort in helping make my dream a reality.

Hillary Biscay

Hillary Biscay is an Ultraman World Champion and the most prolific Iron-distance competitor on the professional womens racing circuit, having completed more than 60 Ironman triathlons.

Introduction

Ambition leads me not only farther than any other man has been before me, but as far as I think it possible for man to go.

Captain James Cook

There are all kinds of endurance races. There are marathons, duathlons, biathlons, triathlons, aquathlons, and adventure races. You can swim, bike, run, snowshoe, crawl through mud pits, and even flee from people dressed as zombies. There are 5k runs, traditional 51.5 km Olympic triathlons, the famous 140.6-mile Ironman, and cycling races such as the Tour de France that span thousands of miles. Just to complete many of these races is considered an accomplishment earned through months or even years of dedicated training.

Athletes at the elite level establish the ceiling of human performance. The fruits of their labors range from the private and intrinsic to a relative amount of fame and fortune. Yet the inordinate amount of time and suffering spent in training makes one wonder if the gain is indeed worth the pain. From first-time marathoners to Ironman World Champions, the question comes up over and again: Why do you do this? What goals compel these people to suffer so mightily, and what does it satisfy within them once theyve reached it? We view a moths attraction to flame as an evolutionary defect. But in a music video built around an against-all-odds sports story, country singer Garth Brooks insisted that life is not tried, it is merely survived / if youre standing outside the fire. Self-destructive as the journey may be, the destination is somehow worth the risk.

Reaching the summit fails to quell the stirring within. Every two-time champion is another testament to the notion that once just isnt enough. Finish lines may be the greatest snipe hunt in human history; no matter how many some athletes cross, they can never truly feel that theyre finished. There can be no end to the running if the running is an end unto itself. Expressing wanderlust through the pursuit of arbitrarily placed gateways is simply part of who we are. Maybe thats why we refer to ourselves as the human race .

There is no better place to see these principles in motion than in a category of events known as ultra endurance. In the last decade these races have grown in popularity among entrants and captured the imagination of the greater public. Our interest is driven by an assumption that the athletes astonishing physical accomplishments must be equaled either by some profound philosophy or insanity. Beyond their extraordinary endurance, they have the discipline to train for countless hours and the determination to push their bodies far beyond what is natural, sometimes to the point of permanently damaging themselves. So if a 5k or an Ironman just isnt enough, what waits for them at the end of a 100-mile run or a 3,000-mile nonstop bike race? What do they know that we dont? What are they getting out of life that were missing?

Its not money. More often than not there are no prizes for the winners. The conventional wisdom, developed from centuries of participation in professional leagues and Olympic competition, says that money isnt just the fuel that kindles interest in a sport, its the essential nutrient for survival. Without it, leagues cant resource events and athletes cant dedicate the necessary time to hone their skills to a higher level. Potential that goes untapped for too long grows stagnant. The fans get bored, the stadiums go empty, the competitors fade away, and the sport dies on the vine. Yet ultra endurance sports defy that convention. With very little material compensation for their efforts, the athletes keep getting faster and go to ever-greater distances. Likewise, organizers have kept the races alive and growing on very narrow margins, often operating in the red.

Nor is it fame. Before Dean Karnazes penned his autobiographical account Ultramarathon Man , there was no such thing as an ultra endurance celebrity, and the most prominent ultra races didnt always fill up with entrants. Today, even the most prolific ultra endurance competitors are largely anonymous and the races remain small. Very few people get to compete on a level that pays the bills, and they readily admit it has more to do with luck than skill or success. Therein lies the foundation of ultras mystique: just about everyone who does it trains as hard as a professional athlete, despite there being virtually no prospect of doing it on a professional basis. Its a huge investment with no tangible return. This aspect leads to a unique purity in ultra racing. More than any other sport in the world, the ultra endurance crowd is seeking something beyond popular comprehensionand they are literally going further than anyone else to find it.