From Runner’sWorld.com. This dude is un-real. Note in the copy below that he talks about “feeling fine” at mile 44. Mile 44????
Matt Carpenter has been winning trail races at altitudes that make most peoples’ nose bleed for over twenty years. His wins at the Pikes Peak Ascent and Marathon are in the double-digits, he’s the course record holder for the Leadville Trail 100-miler, and he’s won astonishingly hard events like the Everest SkyMarathon, held above 17,000 feet.
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How many miles a week do you run, and are they all on trail?
I go by time not distance. In the mountains and especially in altitude, distance becomes meaningless and can get you in trouble. For example, in the next question you mention the Incline—the Old Mt. Manitou Railway—that I used to run a lot, can take me around 24 minutes on an easy day. However, it is only one-mile long, because it is at an average grade of about 40% and gets up to 68%. Likewise, at 14,000′ a 15-minute mile can have you breathing harder than a 5-minute flat mile at sea level. So, I shoot for two hours a day on a consistent basis (just went on a four-month streak with no days under two hours) with 3-4 hours for a Sunday long run, which I may take a little longer if I am training for an ultra.Of all the grueling races you’ve done around the world, what was the hardest moment you’ve faced in competition?
Wow, there have been a lot of hard moments as I have been at this for a long time! But one of the hardest was at the 2007 North Face Endurance Challenge 50-mile in San Francisco. I had a pretty good race going against Uli Steidl. Even at 44 miles I was feeling reasonable and I could even hear Uli barfing behind me. I thought the race was mine. But on the next uphill I had nothing and had to watch him pull away as my quads were just fried from all the previous downhills on the course. That haunted me for a year until I got some redemption in 2008.