A Race For The Ages - ARFTA
August 29 - September 1, 2025
Manchester, Tennessee
150 miles
ARFTA has been around for 11 years and I finally felt old enough to give it a go. The course is on a one mile loop with lots of turns through a parking lot surrounded by baseball fields. Fully lit at night made for a good venue with real bathrooms as well as porta potties along the course. All pavement with some concrete made for a hard course and my feet no longer like multidays on hard courses as they were talking to me.
ARFTA is a race where you get the same number of hours as your age. The oldest was Don at 93 years old. There were many guys in there 80s and the oldest woman was 78. I came in at 63 years old so that gave me 63 hours on course and my start time was 9 pm on Friday night as everyone finishes at noon on Monday, Labor Day. It was “fun” to see the count down clock each loop. First looking forward to how many of hours of “fun” I got to run. Later the “fun” was o my gosh I still have that many hours to go, “fun.”
The course has a lot of ups and downs and one shady section for about a tenth of a mile so most of the course is completely exposed to the heat and sun. The weather was hot to me, in the low 80s, apparently it has been much worse, like in the 90s with higher humidity and even rain. Many people including myself used umbrellas during the heat of the afternoon. Luckily we had a breeze and when we didn’t, you noticed the heat from the pavement. On Friday night while I was waiting to start we could hear the local high school football game including the band and cheering.
I met a fantastic young runner, Jen who was crewing an older dude, Jim. She didn’t start till Saturday evening. There was a parking space in the shade next to their set up and so I took it and spent most of Friday chatting with Jen. Fortunately she distracted me from the waiting to start with conversations about life and running. I appreciated her enthusiasm for ultra running. She was so helpful and managed to get me ice during the race so I wouldn’t have to carry it for a whole loop after purchasing it from the ice truck. She self titled herself my ice beoch. Now i didn’t give her that name but she seemed to like it. You see there is no aid station as you have to support yourself so I bought a cooler and chair at Walmart and filled up that cooler with lots of drinks, ice and some snacks.
Every six hours the race provides meals, individually packaged up from Cracker Barrel. I thought, okay let’s try something new in a race, I can handle it. Ha. Not really. Every time I got a meal I dutifully walked it to the outdoor pavilion to sit down and eat it. This is not something I do in races. I would open the lid and see yellow, all yellow food. Example, biscuits, chicken, corn, and deep fried breaded okra. This was not what I was used to eating, but I thought I would give it a chance. I dutifully took a bite of each and then promptly put the lid back on and threw it away. Such a waste of food and packaging and these weren’t small portions, full on meals. Let’s just say, I won’t be ever eating at a Cracker Barrel. In fact someone asked me if I was going for the 100x100, why continue after a hundred miles. Well I was experimenting and wanted to see if Cracker Barrel ever served a vegetable or other color of food beside yellow. So I had to keep going to see what the next meal was, meatloaf and green beans. The only green was green beans in 3 days.
I came in with a goal of a 150 miles and if I felt good I could see what else I could get. After a lot of naps in the heat and to help my ankle tendons not explode I shut it down at 150 miles with almost three hours to spare. This was my 9th hundred this year so the achiness in my feet and ankles is borderline overuse injury so I need to pay attention as I likely have 3-4 more hundreds to go this year.
It was impressive to see these people crank out the laps. Some of the 70 plus women were truly impressive and while I was resting or napping they were on the loop gettin their miles. The female winner was moving well the entire time. On the first day I picked her out as the winner, she did not disappoint. Congrats Bonnie. 182 miles.
Not sure I like the set up for this race so if I was to do it again, maybe five years from now I would bring my own food and be totally self sufficient. I would also bring extra cushioning shoes. Having the car to nap in was ideal especially with the AC on. Finding a shady section to park in is important. Running at night when it was cool was ideal. Grateful I can continue to do these events. Meeting amazing people along the way is how we do the loop.
Numbers for me: 6100 ft gain. 25 miles in 5:55, 50 miles in 12:47, 100k in 16:36, 75 miles in 24 hours with a 3 hour nap, 100 miles in 33:29:48, 4.27 miles more than 150 likely because you go off course to BR and Pavilion. 84th hundred.