Calgary’s Scott Cooper crossed the end line of the inaugural The Divide 200 in a outstanding 49 hours 47 mins and 59 seconds. Regardless of now not sound asleep all the way through the race, having snake hallucinations at the path and not having finished this kind of super distance, Cooper was once in nice spirits and mentioned he felt relatively excellent. “The direction was once implausible,” he shared. “The volunteers had been superb, and it supposed so much on this kind of faraway direction to return into an help station at evening and feature the ambience so pumped.”
Western Canada’s first-ever 200-mile race, which incorporated the Citadel/Crownest/Flathead area of the southern Rockies (it began and completed at Citadel Mountain Hotel in Pincher Creek, Alta.), kicked off at 8:00 a.m. native time on Tuesday, and runners from throughout Canada and past launched into a 201-mile (324-km) problem alongside portions of the Nice Divide path. Mountaineering 12,335 metres in elevation, with a point in time of 100 hours, runners are trying out their limits within the Rocky Mountains and will have to wrap up their adventure by way of Saturday morning.
Spanning the Continental Divide between Alberta and B.C., the GDT traverses the wasteland of the Rocky Mountains for greater than 1,100 kilometres. It’s recognized for being probably the most planet’s maximum surprising–and difficult–long-distance trails.
Western Canada’s first 200-mile race has begun (and also you received’t wish to leave out a factor)
Cooper boasts a outstanding racing resume that features a second-place end at Fats Canine 120 in 2022 and a up to date win on the Sinister 7 100-miler. In 2022, he led the 100-mile race till he was once pressured to DNF with a shoulder dislocation. 2023’s race was once a redemption spherical, with Cooper crossing the road in 19:16:44. “It was once one of the most well-executed race I’ve had, managing energy and hydration tremendous properly to stay a constant effort all day or even having some lovely forged gasoline within the tank for the ultimate leg of the race,” he shared on social media. When requested if some other 200-mile race was once within the offing, Cooper was once relatively company. “No.” The runner defined that he was once glad together with his race. “While you run a shorter distance, you’ve smaller issues that pass mistaken and you need to return again and connect the ones. There are too many stuff to mend in a race this lengthy,” he mentioned.
Cooper pulled up a chair after he completed and visited together with his canine and his spouse whilst looking forward to the second-place finisher, Canmore’s Sam Dickie, who adopted Cooper in 52:13:44. Dickie and Cooper didn’t know each and every different at first of the race, however fell into a very easy partnership, sharing some 200 kilometres of path till Dickie had to sleep, and Cooper driven onward. Their camaraderie was once obtrusive when Dickie joyfully crossed the road. “That was once such a lot a laugh!” he mentioned.
after frequently making his means throughout the pack, Colin Miller of Fernie, B.C., rounded out the lads’s podium in 54:53:26.
Colorado’s Mika Thewes wins ladies’s race
A couple of hours later, Mika Thewes of Lakewood, Colo., was once the primary girl to pass the end line, in 58 hours, 51 mins and 11 seconds. She had held fourth place during the race, striking on an outstanding dash on the finish to take the win. Just a month in the past, Thewes broke the direction document on the Bigfoot 200 in Washington state (she additionally received in 2021). She has 13 race finishes of 200 miles or extra. “The sunrises had been stunning,” Thewes mentioned, including that the ridge working was once “tricky” and that the terrain reminded her of the Colorado Rockies.