1st Saturday in February, Death Valley, CA, 7-9 AM Start.

App and info: call 415-868-1829 or email: envirosp@wenet.net

This semiannual Team Couch Potato road trip takes place in even numbered years and alternates with the Wild Wild West road trip. If you have never been to Death Valley, this is the way to see it with a running group. We all meet in Barstow at the Harvey house (Lenwood exit) and leave there on Friday at 10 AM to come in from the south end of Death Valley and tour the sights on our way to the Furnace Creek Ranch. When we come to Baker, instead of going on to Las Vegas to loose our money, turn north on Hwy. 127. Lunch is in the old stage town of Shoshone at the Red Buggy Cafe - good place to top off the fuel tank. First stop after lunch and into the valley is the lowest point in the USA and -282 ft below sea level, Badwater. Getting your picture at the sign is mandatory. Next stop is Artists Palate with the colorful rock striations that change with the sun angle.

We get our rooms at the Furnace Creek Ranch and settle in about 3 - 4 PM. Make your room rez in November as they do fill up quick. Call 760-786-2345 and say you want the marathon rate. Camping is also available. There are two good restaurants at the ranch or you can drive back down the road 1/3 mile for fancy grub and a tour of the Furnace Creek Inn.

We assemble in front of the ranch about 7 AM for the pre-race briefing and then load up on all the school busses they could scrounge from a 100 mile radius to transport us across the state line to the marathon start about 5 miles west of Beatty and Rhyolite Nevada. The busses then take the 30K people up the straight jeep road of the first part of the Marathon to Whites pass for their start.

The most interesting part of the race is the 10 miles down Titus Canyon which was formed when a earth quake fault sheared open.

When you finish you can either hop on a bus to go back to the Ranch and its natural hot spring fed pool or have a non running person drive you back in a car. Non running people in your party can take the opportunity to work and aid station or do some sight seeing like going up to Scotty's Castle for the tour. If you have any energy left that afternoon, there is a great museum a half mile north of the Ranch. Dave Horning, the race director and owner of Envirosports, usually holds an informal awards ceremony at the Ranch bar about 6 PM.

Sunday morning is a good opportunity to leave early and drive the hour up the road to catch the 9 AM Scotty's Castle tour - it is well worth it. We leave Death Valley after checking out Stove Pipe Wells on Hwy. 190 and then on up over Towne Pass toward Panamint Springs. Turn Left just after the bridge on to Trona Hwy. 178. Trona is a good place to refuel. 11 miles past Trona turn left on the Trona/Red Mountain road. At Hwy. 395 turn right for about a mile then left to Randsburg. There is a recovery Hash run in Randsburg at 2 PM or just stop for lunch and a Black Bart.

Mark Ryne's Death Valley run experience:

A large group of Foothill Flyers participated in the Death Valley Trail Marathon and 18 miles races on February 2, 2002.

All the runners gathered for a loud and boisterous pre-race briefing at the Furnace Creek Ranch. We then boarded buses for the 25 mile trip over the Grapevine mountains to the start area near Beatty, Nevada. About half way there, the buses pulled into a rest stop and we were encouraged to use the facilities because of the limited number of port-a-potties at the start. There are some advantages to being on the first bus...

The marathoners were dropped of at their start line while the 18 milers drove ahead to their start area. The marathon began at about 9 am with clear skies but cold temperatures and a chilly brisk wind. The course started on an arrow straight dirt road through the desert heading toward the mountains that are the eastern boundary of Death Valley. The first aid station was unmanned (just a case of gallon water bottles). Then the course began to climb up into the mountains. We reached the 18 miler start and the next aid stations at White Pass. Then came a steep downhill followed by a brutal 2 mile ascent. As we climbed, we started to see the beautiful strata and rock formations of Death Valley. We finally came to the highest point of the race beneath a towering, bright gray-green rock face - appropriately named "Red Pass". There was even a little snow on the shadowed northern slopes of the mountains. From here it was 14 miles to the finish, with an unrelenting 5000 foot elevation loss.

We were running down a wide and shallow valley over loose gravel. The next aid station was at an abandoned mining site named Leadfield. Some of the inventive support workers had pulled the back seat out of a mini-van so they could relax in comfort while waiting to help the runners.

Here we entered Titus Canyon. We were running in a narrow river valley over sandy and rocky terrain. The valley walls went straight up on both sides, with lots of multicolor layers, twisted and bent in odd directions. There were even Indian petroglyphs on some of the walls. Your quads are burning from the relentless down hill and running on the soft, uneven surface.

After what seemed like an endless series of descending tight snake turns, we suddenly burst out of the canyon with a magnificent view of Death Valley spread out in front of us.

From here it was a long 3 miles down a sandy dirt road over the debris apron that had washed out of the canyon. This was the toughest part of the race. You could see bright reflections off the windshields of the cars and buses parked at the finish line. They looked like they were right there in front of you, but as you ran, they just did not seem to get any closer. But finally, being cheered by our family and friends, we reached the finish line at the road to Scotty's Castle.

One of the neat features about the race was that updated results were posted about every 10 minutes. So by the time you had cooled down and picked up your finisher T-Shirt and medallion you could limp over and read your official finish time.

The we loaded back onto the buses for the 35 mile trip back to Furnace Creek and a dip in the heated swimming pool.

Information about this server

The location of this page is www.foothillflyers.org/reviews/deathvalley.html copyright ©2003 artsci inc. all right reserved...