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By Davy Crockett
Both a podcast episode and a full article
You might ask, what does the history of endurance riding have to do with ultrarunning? There are many close parallels between these two endurance sports. Ultrarunners should feel indebted to those of the endurance riding sport who had the vision to establish some early trail 100-milers for runners. The trail 100-miler inherited many of the same procedures of aid stations, course markings, trail work, crews, medical checks, cut-off times, and of course the belt buckle award. Part 1 covered the very early history of Endurance riding up to 1955.
By 1955 the sport of endurance riding had existed in America for more than 40 years since the initial competitive 1913 ride in Vermont. The sport was called “endurance riding” by those who participated in it for the early decades. Part 2 will cover the very significant birth of the famed Western States Trail Ride (aka Tevis Cup), which inherited practices from the older endurance rides, especially the Vermont 100 Trail Ride.
Endurance riding is the equestrian sport that includes controlled long-distance riding/racing. The sport has existed for more than a century in various forms. 100-mile trail ultramarathons, especially the Western States Endurance Run, Old Dominion 100, and Vermont 100 can trace their roots to endurance riding. Other trail 100s that emerged in the 1980s were also influenced by endurance riding practices.
There is a special breed of ultrarunner that historian Jim Shapiro in 1980 called the “solo artist.” These runners usually had solid ultrarunning abilities, but instead of regularly completing in races, they used their abilities to accomplish stunts. This was done to garner attention from spectators and fans and to gain income and sponsorships. Solo artists would always invent and claim “world records.” They had creative nicknames and their marketing people would prop them up as being the “world’s greatest runner.” Solo artists have always existed in ultrarunning and still exist today.
During the World War II period in 1940s, ultradistance races in America totally disappeared. Many of the talented runners turned in their leather running shoes for leather boots and served their country in war. But as servicemen, there were many endurance activities that took place both on the bases and on the battle field.
Read the article here.
The fifty-mile race is a distance most of today’s ultrarunners eventually run. In 2017 there were about 300 50-mile races held in America with about 16,000 unique finishers. At nearly twice the distance of a marathon, it truly involves a different approach than running a marathon both mentally and physically. Ultrarunning legend, David Horton once wrote, “Most ultra-runners, me included, consider that real ultras are 50 miles or longer.” Since the 1960s, the shorter distances (50K, etc.) were typically used by aspiring ultrarunners to train for completing at the 50-mile distance.
As the Great Depression began raging across the world, race events for professional ultrarunners pretty much dried up in the United States. All professional sports suffered in America during that time. For a few years, promoters in Canada filled the void, and were able to attract some of the most talented American ultrarunners to head northward, to run in their races.