Pushing themselves to the extreme edge of their physical limitations last weekend, three Prince George women did the job of five in the Canadian Death Race.
It was a race like no other they had ever experienced, a multistage endurance run that made one of them sick to her stomach, but their efforts on the course at Grande Cache, Alta., paid off for Devon Kelsh, Elizabeth Dabels and Tara O'Brien.
In their first attempt in the 125-kilometre race, which started Saturday and finished Sunday, Sole Sisters took second place in the women's team relay, finishing in 17 hours 44 minutes 29 seconds, Their time was more than two hours quicker than the 20-hour goal they set for themselves. They were 13th overall out of 56 teams, male and female.
"We did well, it was awesome," said Kelsh. "We were thrilled to finish it. So pumped, but we had no inclination we would place (on the podium) at that point, so to find out we got second was incredible. The team ahead of us was a team of five - they had a fresh runner for every leg and they were over an hour ahead of us."
The winning women's team, What the Hill?, clocked 16:10:01. Brandon Miller of Grande Prairie, Alta., took the men's solo race in 14:26:25, while Rhondal Backman-Loo of Brooks, Alta., captured the women's solo race in 16:58:47.
The mercury climbed into the mid-20s C on race day, which was great for the race volunteers but not so good for Kelsh, 38. After Dabels, 44, tagged her after running the first two sections, Kelsh ran the third leg Saturday afternoon then had to wait more than five hours for the 41-year-old O'Brien to finish the long and challenging fourth leg. That section required her to summit Mount Hamel, the last of three mountain peaks on the route, and all that waiting took a toll on Kelsh not long after she started the fifth and final stage.
"The weather was the nicest they'd had in years, it was a blue blazer day and everyone survived without injury, but it was super-hot in the valley where I was and I got a bit of heatstroke," said Kelsh. "I tried to get a little rest and re-hydrate while Tara ran, but about 10 minutes into Leg 5 I got sick."
Kelsh said she thought about quitting the race but did not want to let the team down. After emptying her stomach she started feeling better and began drinking liquids to raise her electrolyte levels and ate some gels to give her enough energy to finish the race. Her final section was run completely in the dark, her biggest fear going into the race.
"I have a really good headlight and honestly I felt so crappy I didn't even think about being in the dark," she said. "There was about 6K of single track at the beginning of that section and it's really rooty and overgrown so I went down twice on that section. It was a lot more technical in some areas than you were expecting but it was good."
"I felt pretty good at the end, surprisingly. Liz and Tara both had a lot of climbing to do and they have sore quads, which to be expected."
Kelsh said she and her running partners are already thinking about their next race, and it could prove even more challenging - the Sinister 7 ultra off-road race in Crowsnest Pass in southwestern Alberta next July.The 161km race climbs seven peaks and involves 5,687 metres of elevation gain.
