Running News Daily

80-year-old runs wild time at USATF 100 Mile Championships

The USATF 100-mile road national championships were held in Henderson, Nev. on Friday and Saturday at the Jackpot Ultra Running Festival, and while the elite men and women produced impressive results, the performance of the weekend has to go to David Blaylock, an 80-year-old athlete from Salt Lake City, Utah. Blaylock finished the race in a fantastic time of 29 hours, 47 minutes and 29 seconds, and he was followed by three other men in the 80-plus age division, each of whom finished the race.

80-plus division 

Before this year’s race, Blaylock had already raced the Jackpot 100 several times, and he had managed to break 30 hours on multiple occasions. In 2022, the final year of his 70s, he ran 31:56:28 at the event. While this was still a great result, it wouldn’t have been a surprise if Blaylock, now in the M80 division, didn’t break 30 hours again over 100 miles, but he did just that on Saturday, crossing the finish line with 12 and a half minutes to spare.

The fact that Blaylock ran 100 miles at the age of 80 is impressive enough, but his sub-30-hour result makes the achievement all the more amazing. His average pace was just over 11 minutes per kilometre for the 160K race. Although it’s unclear where Blaylock’s result ranks all-time among Americans, based on the USATF record books, his 29:47 sits near the top. The current M80 American record over 100 miles belongs to Maurice Robinson, who posted a time of 29:03:21 at a race in Kansas in March 2022.

While Blaylock ultimately won the M80 race by more than 20 minutes, his victory was far from a lock. He had to chase 83-year-old Edward Rousseau for most of the run, and for a long stretch, he was an hour back of first place. It wasn’t until the 95th mile that Blaylock made the pass on Rousseau, and from that point on, his lead only grew.

Rousseau ended up crossing the line in a fantastic time of 30:09:08, and 80-year-olds Ian Maddieson and Denis Trafecanty finished third and fourth, respectively, in times of 37:15:39 and 37:59:42.

The elite races

San Francisco‘s Jonah Backstrom, 49, took home the men’s national 100-mile title with a winning time of 14:11:03. He won the race by more than 30 minutes over second-place finisher Zach Merrin, who finished in 14:48:59. Third place went to Pete Kostelnick, who stopped the clock almost an hour later in 15:47:24. In the women’s race, Nevada local Sierra DeGroff won in 15:59:56, just eking out a sub-16-hour result. She finished close to an hour ahead of second-place Lisa Cabiles, who completed the race in 16:42:54. Heather Huggins finished third in a time of 17:09:29.