MIDWAY -- A fan approached Karl Meltzer hours after the Sandy runner had collected his third victory Sunday in the Wasatch 100-Mile Endurance Run to ask him to pose for a snapshot.
    "Got to get a picture of the legend," the fan said.
    It's getting to be that way. Meltzer took the lead Saturday afternoon just past the Lamb's Canyon aid station, near the halfway point of the race, and remained in front to the Midway finish, which he reached early Sunday in 20 hours, 46 minutes. Meltzer had won his second consecutive Hardrock 100, so he has collected wins in two of the nation's toughest 100-milers in a single summer.
    Betsy Nye of Tahoe City, Calif., picked up her third consecutive Wasatch women's title, finishing 18th overall in 26:36. Nye even tacked on a detour of 15 minutes when she missed a turn before Lamb's Canyon. Mountain bikers had moved the logs placed there earlier by race officials to keep runners on the correct route.
    Nye matched Meltzer in winning the women's crown at Hardrock in July.
    A field of 218 runners started the 24th annual Wasatch, with 134 finishing at Midway within the 36-hour time limit.
    Joe Kulak of Lakewood, Colo., chopped more than three hours off the Grand Slam record, finishing second behind Meltzer in 21:53. Fifteen other runners also completed four of the country's oldest 100-milers to earn the Grand Slam award. Kulak's cumulative time for the four races was 75:07.
    "Of the four 100s," he said, "I feel the best after this one."
    Rebounding from a head cold last week, Meltzer arrived at the Lamb's Canyon aid station at mile 53 just minutes behind Salt Lake City physician Kevin Shilling. Meltzer's crew immediately doused him with water.
    "I was boiling," said Meltzer. "The sun had come out an hour before. It was instantly 20 degrees hotter. At least it felt that way."
    When he started shivering, Meltzer knew he was ready to go. He passed Shilling, who later dropped out, shortly after leaving the aid station, then fought to stay ahead of Kulak for much of the remainder of the race.
    Meltzer hadn't counted on Kulak putting up such a strong fight, considering the toll he expected Kulak's Grand Slam attempt to have exacted.
    "I totally thought I was going to drop him," said Meltzer. "It was not the case. He was really strong."
    Only after passing the 82-mile mark did Meltzer feel his lead -- 26 minutes, at that point -- over Kulak would hold. With Nate McDowell, last year's Wasatch champion and course record holder, as his pacer, Meltzer reached the Midway finish line just before 2 a.m.
    Tim Spence of Salt Lake City placed third in 22:17, his 11th Wasatch finish. Two-time Wasatch champion Leland Barker of Smithfield placed fourth.
    Brandon Sybrowsky, a Perry native, placed 25th, a week after finishing a tough 150-kilometer race in Europe. Battling residual fatigue, Sybrowsky grabbed a one-hour nap at Brighton before crossing the finish line for the 11th time.
    Rick Gates of Salt Lake City completed his 19th Wasatch. The youngest finisher was Andy Knight, 18. Grant Holdaway, 72, slipped under the 36-hour time barrier by less than two minutes to rank as the oldest finisher.
    The Vineyard farmer will be back at work today, said his son Jeff, who also completed the race: "He'll be out in the field picking corn tomorrow."
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Wasatch 100 Endurance Run: Oh baby, does Lowry have story to tell about this race
By Janet Rae Brooks
The Salt Lake Tribune
LAMB'S CANYON --
Julia Alexandra Lowry is less than a day old, but already she is destined to become part of the lore of the Wasatch 100.
    The 8-pound, 13-ounce infant arrived in the world at 2:45 p.m. Saturday, just about the time her father, an eight-time finisher of the Wasatch 100-Mile Endurance Run, would have hit Alexander Ridge, above Lamb's Canyon.
    But early that morning, Phil Lowry had scratched from the Kaysville start of the race, after receiving a pre-dawn phone call from his wife in Springville. The couple's seventh child had been due next week, but things were going a little faster than expected, she told him. She needed to go to the hospital right away.
    Phil Lowry made the birth, but missed the race. So he talked his wife into naming their new-born daughter Julia Alexandra, in tribute to the Wasatch 100 and the portion of the course -- Alexander Ridge -- he had expected to be traversing at the time of her birth.
    "This is the next one of the Lowrys, this is No. 7, and I'm going to be able to explain to her -- and her siblings also because they might be part of the Wasatch family then, too -- that I missed the race the day she was born," said Lowry. an attorney. "It will be a neat story for her."
    A little extreme? Only to those not enamored of the Wasatch 100. The mountainous point-to-point course from Kaysville to Midway is billed as "100 Miles of Heaven and Hell." And it's probably a bit of both of those that draws people back year after year.
    "Slurpie!" exclaimed Dave Hunt as he pulled into Lamb's Canyon aid station at mile 53 Saturday afternoon. "Dang!"
    Not only did his support crew have a Slurpie to hand Hunt before he even sat down, they also had a footbath ready.
    "I bet that feels like heaven, doesn't it?" said aid station co-captain Verna Bennion.
    Hell? That's easy.
    "Leave the skin on! Leave the skin on!" said one of Dylan Andrews' crew as they peeled off a bloody sock to reveal a massive blister on Andrews' right heel. Andrews kept up a non-stop stream of chatter as he got patched up.
    "I need to just really hydrate," he said. "I really can't stay long. I just really need to suck down some water and head out."
    Andrews was soon on his way, leaving his crew wondering if the patch over his blister would hold. Mark Colby's sons, Seth, 7, and Zach, 4, wandered around the aid station, waiting for Dad. Their mother, Amy, had pinned yellow post-it notes on the boys' T-shirts bearing their father's race number.
    After last year's Wasatch, Mark Colby asked his wife to make sure he didn't end up on another Wasatch 100 starting line.
    "He said, 'Don't ever let me run this again,' " said Amy Colby.
    "And here we are," she added good-naturedly. "This year, he wants to get below 30 hours."
    Brandon Sybrowsky had sewn a black ribbon on his race shirt Friday night in memory of fellow Wasatch runner, Stephen Utley, who died in June of cancer. Sybrowsky flew back from Europe on Wednesday after running the 150-kilometer Tour du Mont Blanc last weekend. He hadn't missed a Wasatch 100 start since he first entered the race 12 years ago.
    Although he finished third last year, race-ravaged legs slowed Sybrowsky's pace this year.
    After his wife, Krissy Moehl Sybrowsky, rubbed his thighs with arnica gel, Sybrowsky got to his feet and called to Murray Schart, still sitting sipping ginger beer as his crew fussed over him.
    "Come on, Murray."
    "I'm coming, I'm coming," Schart replied. "Go slow."
    "I will," said Sybrowsky, as he set off towards Lamb's Canyon, exchanging a high-five with his nephew, Connor, before tackling the final 47 miles of the race.
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By Stephen Speckman
Deseret Morning News - Tuesday 9 Sep 2003

       Amazing. Inspirational. And a little nuts.  Grant Holdaway, 72, became the oldest finisher ever Sunday in the  23-year history of the Wasatch Front 100 Mile Endurance Run. Yes, he actually ran and hiked through the Wasatch Mountains for 100 miles, and in just a hair under the official 36-hour time limit. To watch him finish sent tears of joy into the eyes of anyone with a heightened awareness of what it is that Holdaway accomplished.  A crowd cheered wildly as he hobbled into The Homestead in Midway — in pain, hot, dehydrated,  bloodied, dirty, but smiling, with less than two minutes separating him from the heartbreak of not finishing in time.
     When he was a younger 69, this stubborn farmer and former teacher from Vineyard finished in 35 hours, 31 minutes. This year, all he did to prepare was run a 100-miler in Texas,  a 50-miler in Tucson, another 50-miler in Utah and a 100-kilometer race. "I've been paying the price, you know," he said. "You have to take care of your body."
     For him, the big payoff is the finish.  The 2003 Wasatch 100 was his fifth try. Twice he finished after the clock watchers had punched out, once only a few minutes after the cutoff. On Sunday he fell into the arms of his wife, Barbara, and to the ground, where people aimed their cameras and adoration.   His recovery began with a few moments of just lying in the cool grass, 100 miles away from the start near Kaysville. Then a few Popsicles and a massage. Early Monday morning, he was back at work,  blisters and all.
     By his side Sunday was daughter Wendy, whose third try at finishing ended at the 75-mile mark.  Son Jeff finished his fourth Wasatch, about seven hours ahead of his dad, in plenty of time for a  congratulatory hug. For the Holdaways, it's about the challenge. Still, a lot of people who hear about this race react by saying only things like, "insane" or "crazy." They don't know half the story.
     Consider that 218 runners started this year, but only 134 made it — that's 84 people, many much younger than Holdaway, who for either  medical, physical, mental or emotional reasons couldn't cross the finish line.
     Holdaway's first pacer, Kim Struthers, kept telling his charge to "make hay while the sun shines," a favorite saying of Holdaway's. When he fell a few times down the stretch, pacer Matt Mills  would joke with him, "You saying your prayers down there?" In this race against the self, runners laugh, cry, sweat, throw up,  nearly fall asleep on the trail and play games in their head to trick themselves into putting one foot in front of the other. They plod over roots, rocks, past mountain lions and rattlesnakes in the searing sun, rain and lightning and in the bitter cold.  Outside of being physically fit, it takes guts just to start the Wasatch 100. Finishing takes ironclad determination, drive, mental and emotional toughness, pacers and crew members who will stay with you throughout the chilly, wee hours of the night.  Holdaway did it at 72.  Some runners get choked up at the end. Holdaway just smiled — everyone else cried and cheered for this celebration of life.
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Wasatch 100 keeps luring back runners
By Stephen Speckman
Deseret Morning News  - Wednesday - 27 Aug 2003
      You'd figure that running one 100 mile-race in your life would be enough — OK, for most folks, more than enough.  Nah.  Not for guys like David Blaylock and Rick Gates.  They keep running and running the Wasatch Front 100 Mile Endurance Run year after year.  On Sept. 6, Blaylock will be going for his 10th Wasatch 100 finish, Gates for his 19th. Two women have previously reached 10 Wasatch finishes  while this year a total of three men will be going for their 10th.  "It's my favorite weekend of the year," Gates explains.
Forget the grueling mileage or a fast finishing time. For Gates, it's about getting the chance to spend half a weekend running and walking through the Wasatch Mountains. It's about meeting new people along the course and seeing old friends from races gone by.  The goal for all the runners is to at least finish under the official cutoff time of 36 hours. Gates has reached that goal with each try, finishing in under 26 hours 10 years ago.  "I'm getting slower and slower," the 46-year-old Cottonwood Heights resident admits.
      The course record — 19 hours, 52 minutes and 25 seconds — was set by Nate McDowell last year, when 123 out of 208 starters finished the race, which starts at 5 a.m. at the East Mountain Wilderness Park in Kaysville and ends in Midway at The Homestead. But McDowell won't be on hand this year to challenge two-time Wasatch 100 winner Karl Meltzer, who holds the course record at Colorado's Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Run, which many consider as the toughest ultramarathon in the country. Meltzer won this year's
 Hardrock.  Instead, Meltzer will be challenged by the likes of two-time Wasatch winner Leland Barker, Brandon Sybrowsky and Tim Spence.
       This year's top female contenders include ultrarunning forces Betsy Nye and Susan Hunter Yates. Each has won the Wasatch 100 in years past.   But predicting a winner for a 100-mile race is about like guessing what the weather will be in two weeks.  Anything can happen.  Even Meltzer once declared DNF — did not finish — in the Wasatch 100.  Not finishing Utah's toughest footrace wasn't an option for Blaylock on his first try back in 1990. At the 92 mile mark, race officials told him he could quit and come join the post-race party.
Blaylock, now 60, took off his race number and finished to the singular applause of his wife, Mary Jane."It's lonely summers," she says of her husband's devotion to training for the Wasatch 100, which Blaylock has attempted to finish 13 times.  Summer Saturdays means David is gone all day, running in the mountains. "We've acclimated to it.  "You just let them do their adventuring," she adds, "and cross your
fingers that they're going to be OK."  She's talking about her husband and son, Derek, who may just win this year's race. Derek Blaylock, 34, has finished third in the past and this year has taken five months off from working at his dad's construction company to train.  But Dad is already looking past this year's race to the goal of getting three generations of Blaylocks across the finish line. Yep.  Already Derek's 8-year-old son is looking like a future ultra runner.  "It's neat that my family is interested in running," David Blaylock  laughs, "or it might not work too well."
     Same thing for Gates, who has crossed each Wasatch 100 finish line for the past 11 years with his son at his side. His wife pitches in as a crew member and even his parents make the trip from their Georgia home to help.  Of course, both Gates and the senior Blaylock are asked all the time, "Why?"  For Blaylock, going for 10 finishes is about capturing a "trinket," the ruby ring he'll get from race organizers if he reaches his goal.  "It's what the trinket means," he says. "It seems like a little punctuation to put in there somewhere." That, he adds, and he's no good at shorter distances.  Again, kind of like Gates, who was running those puny 26.2-mile marathons back in the early '80s but just couldn't break the 2:49 barrier,  a goal he set for himself. But, why, after 19 Wasatch 100s?  "You can't explain it," Gates says. "You have to come out and really see it.  It's a whole different beast."
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Joe Kulak of Denver, Colorado, broke the Grand Slam 100-mile record by more than three hours.
(Ultramarathon World)
When he finished the Wasatch Front 100-Miler, September 7th, Kulak had a combined time of 75 hours and seven minutes in the four spectacular 100-miler Grand Slam events ( Western States, Vermont, Leadville, and Wasatch).   Kulak finished second to race winner Karl Meltzer.  His Grand Slam time broke the previous record of  78:22:47 set by Ian Torrence in 2002. "I am very happy with setting a new record but the finest memories I have were at the award ceremony looking at the assembled human wall of pain, suffering, determination, and joy," Kulak said. " I was proud to be one of the 16 individuals who finished the 2003 Grand Slam."
     The Grand Slam got its start in 1986.  When the Grand Slam began, the four races in the series were the oldest 100 milers in the country and were among only six 100's available. Ultrarunners now have over 30  trail races in the 100 mile distance to run.  By also finishing the Old Dominion 100 in Virginia where he came in first and tackling the  Angeles Crest 100 in southern California in October, Kulak hopes to win the six-race Last Great Race series. "With five 100 miler's behind me and The Grand Slam series completed, I'm looking forward to running Angeles Crest in three weeks. It has been a long, adventuresome summer full of fond memories. It will be a restful fall and winter."

Kulak's Grand Slam Race Times

Western State 100 Mile Endurance Run, CA            June 28                   6th                 18:14:59

Vermont 100, VT                                                             July 19                   1st                   14:55:26

Leadville Trail 100, CO                                             August 16                   5th                  20:03:25

Wasatch Front 100, UT                                          September 6                   2nd                 21:53:10

Total Cumulative Time                                                                                                            75:07:00
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 Story by Peter Gambaccini -> Runners World On Line
Joe Kulak, 35, of Lakewood, Colorado set new cumulative time records in 2003 for the Grand Slam of 100-mile trail races--Western State in California, the Vermont 100, Leadville Trail in Colorado, and Wasatch Front in Utah--and for the "Last Great Race," comprised of those four plus the Old Dominion 100-Mile in Virginia on June 7 and the Angeles Crest 100 in southern California on September 27. Kulak's overall Grand Slam time of 75 hours and seven minutes broke Ian Torrence's 2002 mark of 78:22:47. His Last Great Race clocking of 114 hours, 23 minutes, and 49 seconds took more than 14 hours off Marshall Ulrich's 1989 record of 129:00:05. Kulak took first places at Old Dominion and at Vermont. The Last Great Race included 110,252 feet of climb and 118,591 of descent, and temperatures in the series ranged from 30 to 104 degrees. Kulak, an environmental insurance broker, calculates that he consumed 75,000 calories during the six 100-milers. He and his wife are expecting their first child in April.

Runner's World Daily: Have you been on this 100-mile circuit for a few years?
Joe Kulak: Yeah. Since 1994, I've done sixteen 100-milers, as well as sixteen 26.2-mile marathons. All told, I've done 51 marathons and ultra marathons. My best marathon was 2:52 in Paris in 2000.

RWD: You bettered the Grand Slam record by three hours. At what point did you think you'd possibly get it? Was it even before the last race?
JK: Having run three of the four races last year, I knew them really well. The big unknown was Wasatch. I'd never been on it, I didn't know any of the trails. It was also considered the hardest race of the four, with almost 27,000 feet of climb and 27,000 down--54,000 feet of change, predominately single-track trail. I had a pretty good idea I had a shot at the record after the second race, the Vermont 100, which I actually won. Because I had such a good time, 14 hours and 55 minutes there, at that point I was over two hours ahead of the Grand Slam record set by Ian Torrence last year. The third race, the Leadville Trail 100, is basically my home turf. I'd done it six times before this year, so I had a good comfort feeling going into it. I was a little bit tired and did have problems up there, but I was reasonably confident I could go into that and have a good race. But Wasatch was the unknown. Going in, I was three hours ahead of the record, but Wasatch was notorious as the hardest of the four races.

RWD: Because of your three-hour margin, did you run Wasatch conservatively to preserve the record?
JK: I wouldn't say I held back. I did hold back probably for the first 30 miles, knowing that I needed to conserve energy because I already had four 100-milers under my belt (including the earlier Old Dominion) and was already feeling a little tired. The second place at Wasatch was a bit of a surprise. I wasn't as concerned about  placement there. I knew I had to break about 25 and a half hours for the record. I actually felt pretty good all day.

RWD: You did six 100-milers within 15 weeks. What's the toughest part about recovering in-between them, and were you really able to show up to each one fully recovered?
JK: No, there's a cumulative effect. And recovery really becomes a key component of the program. All the training for this is really done in February, March, April, and May. Once you're into the first one, it becomes a matter of just getting from one to the next injury free and not so banged up. So I had quite a bit of down time. In the 21 to 28 days between races typically I would spend half of that time not doing anything, completely resting. I did have a bad IT band problem going into Vermont, and some Achilles problems going into Old Dominion and after it.

RWD: Does the hard training differ that much from what a marathoner would do?
JK: Our long runs usually start at 20 miles and, at least once every other week, can extend as far out as 40 to 45 miles. Eighty to ninety percent of my training is off road, and 75 percent of that is up and down. I've got a couple of local six to eight-mile runs that consist of 2000 or 3000 feet of climbing. That's not hard to come by in Colorado.

RWD: What's it like to come East, where the mountains are nowhere near as high as in Colorado?
JK: Old Dominion had 12,000 feet of climbing and Vermont had 14,000. But the climb tends to be much shorter. You won't tend to find a single climb of more than 1000 feet and you don't have the elevation to contend with. Coming from here to there, we have more red blood cells and we're used to the altitude. When I go there, I really don't feel the climbs. I don't get winded. At Old Dominion and Vermont, I could talk the whole way at a very comfortable pace. At Vermont, you can really cruise. That's a fast race.

RWD: Did you have a fairly traditional running background at the beginning?
JK: I was a high school runner, cross country and track. I didn't run in college. When I got out of college, I started to run 5ks and 10ks. I was originally from Philadelphia. I moved to Colorado, which is just a hotbed of adventure racing and marathoning and outdoor sports in general. I quickly hooked up with a running group and got roped into doing these ultramarathons. It's not hard to come across people out here who do this kind of stuff.

RWD: Are you enjoying some down time now?
JK: I'm taking some time off. I'm a little burned out. I've slept ten or 11 hours a night for the last two weeks. I want to take a little rest, and I want to get ready for our arrival (the baby) in April. I'll do a bunch of skiing, work on the house, and probably do some snowshoeing this winter. I'll probably still run 30 or 40 miles a week during the early winter, and then in February in March, probably 50 to 70 a week, and then March through May, from 65 up to as much as 110.
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Grand Slam Adventure 2003                  by Terry Park