It could be a video game, it could be a remake of “Highlander” (“There will be only one left”), and it is not ruled out that that very film inspired the person who invented one of the most extreme and singular races that exist in the world.
It is called the“Riverhead Backyard ReLaps Ultra,” it is run in New Zealand near Auckland (the last edition was held last April 16), and it is unequivocally titled, “Who will survive?”
Simple rules, the hard part is winning
The only rule, come to think of it, is very simple: only one or one participant can win. All others are classified as DNF, meaning “Did Not Finish”. Unlike any other race, it does not count to be the fastest but only the strongest, and it is not certain that those who are on paper are also on the ground. It is also a race in which potentially and at all times everyone (but everyone) has an equal chance to win. Even as the 73 who participated this year thinned out, the remaining ones continued to individually have the same opportunities. Very democratic.
To give an idea of how being strong matters relatively, this edition was attended by Chris Bisley, one of New Zealand’s most capable ultratrail runners, who broke out in the previous one after 23 hours. Twenty-three hours is a long time, and yet he felt terrible about it, partially justifying himself with the enormous pressure he felt on his shoulders and apologizing to fans for disappointing them. This edition for him was not just “another edition” but the one of redemption.
The land
The race takes place “in the backyard”: there is a circuit and that everyone has to follow it, repeatedly, obsessively. Since this is an ultratrail, however, we are not talking about the loop of an athletic track but a mostly clay path that in the rain (which was not lacking) becomes even more impassable because the shoes sink in and it is like running on suckers.
Exacerbating the race conditions is not only the weather but also geography: in fact, at this time of year in New Zealand the days last exactly 12 hours, which means that half of the race takes place in the dark. Start at 6 a.m. and dark at 6 p.m. And it goes on. By that time, however, already 50 participants had withdrawn.
The characters
The stories of those who ran it are perhaps the most beautiful part of this race because they explain and demonstrate how the motivation to get to the end of an extreme endurance race is not only given to you by your physique and your head but you also need a spirit driven by a larger plan.
You have already met Bisley: he is determined to make up for the bad impression he made last year, and he is just plain cool. Sam Harvey, on the other hand, is a decidedly marginal and odd figure in the ultratrail world: he is a former rugby coach who, when he was professionally following a team in Tennessee, met Anna and fell in love with her. Back in New Zealand he found himself separated from his beloved because of covid but finally in Christmas 2020 he was able to fly back to her and propose to her. And he did it not just anywhere but in Frozen Head State Park, that is, the place where the most famous of the world’s most absurd races is held: the Barkley Marathons, that is, a competition so extreme that in all its 35 editions only 15 people have managed to finish it.
From that park Sam brought home a keepsake: two small stones, quai a talisman that he kept with him throughout the race, testifying to his commitment to win. Right, I forgot to mention one thing: the prize for the Riverhead Backyard ReLaps Ultra is a plane ticket and registration for the sister race, in Tennessee, called Big’s Backyard or Big Dog’s Backyard Ultra, the other crazy race invented by that sadistic lunatic (affectionately said) Lazarus Cantrell, i.e., the inventor of the Barkley Marathons.
The predictions were clear from the beginning: if you had to bet on who could make it you would have to bet on those who were seeking redemption and those who were doing it for love, so that they could return to their beloved Anna and marry her eventually.
Only one will remain
Let us now fast-forward: we have already seen that after 12 hours and as darkness fell, 50 people withdrew. Throughout the night the handful of 20-odd survivors continued to run through the mud and rain, but in the dark. Some resting briefly before each new lap (which lasted an average of 50 minutes) and others changing shirts and shoes. Sam meanwhile destroyed a couple and exchanged them for ones borrowed from his father. He has no intention of giving up. After 168 km and 25 hours, Fiona Hayvice, a strong ultratrail runner, also gives up. Only the two of them remain in the race: Sam Harvey and Chris Bisley, the force of love and the force of revenge. Neither of them has the slightest intention of giving in. And in fact the race is by no means over. They have been running it for a whole day, but something is still left in those legs, and what is not there they go forcibly, each one, stubbornly.
That something is a lot: so much so that it will be necessary to wait until the 37th hour to see one of the two give way, after having been head to head always, preceding or following each other with gaps of a few minutes and finding each other at the refreshment point before each new lap without ever making eye contact.
But the 37th hour is fatal for Sam Harvey. Those who see him running now notice something strange: his right leg no longer follows orders; it goes where it wants. Sam has no more; he is literally finished. He completes the round and tells his crew that he calls it quits and declares himself defeated: he is not only physically exhausted but also mentally. In the latter stages of the race he hallucinated: he saw a crocodile and especially Baby Yoda. Perhaps of the two, this is the hallucination that convinced him it was time to quit.
He is sorry and curses himself for not making it, for quitting just when the race was between him and only one other. May he need it for the next edition, to charge himself mentally and physically as Bisley was able to do? For now we wish him to go to Tennessee anyway and marry his beloved Anna. This absurd and heroic race he did counts as proof of love. And how.
(Cover photo: Instagram)