Can Jimmy Elam Break Geoff Roes' Unbreakable Wasatch 100 Record?

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We are at the tail end of summer here in the Wasatch, which is precisely when things are heating up on the 100 mile mountain running scene. That is September in a nutshell. And it is always kicked off here in the Salt Lake City area by the Wasatch front 100.

I have been around this race for almost every edition since 2017, either as a pacer spectator or crew member this time around, I decided that I would show up as a member of the media because I thought something special might happen.

One of the local crushers on the scene, Jimmy Elam was on the start line. And I figured that Even with an altered course, and even with a more difficult course, he could seriously challenge the record of 18:30 set by the legendary Geoff Roes back in 2009. That was 15 years ago.

Some context on the race for those that aren't familiar -

The Wasatch 100 is held on the first Friday and Saturday after Labor Day each year. It's one of the original hundred mile ultra trail marathons in the U S and the point to point course stretches from the East Wilderness State Park in Kaysville, Utah, all the way to Soldier Hollow in Midway covering some of the coolest terrain in the central Wasatch Range along the way.

Runners will follow proper footpaths, game trails, dirt roads, a few bits of pavement, and along the way they are climbing and descending over 40,000 feet of terrain all between altitudes of 5,000 and 10,000 feet.

As the race website says, and I have to quote this because it is amazing.

"The Wasatch Front 100 is one of the most uniquely challenging ultra running events in the world. It is a study in contrasts, peaks and valleys, trail and scree, heat and cold, wet and dry, summer and winter, day and night, desolation lake and point supreme. I can't and I will. Dickens could have had the Wasatch in mind when he wrote, 'it was the best of times. It was the worst of times.' The primitive and isolated nature of the course is both its beauty and its challenge for it requires the individual runner to rely primarily on himself or herself, rather than the race's support systems. Wasatch is not just the distance and speed. It is adversity, adaptation, and perseverance."

With all of that in mind, let's get into this footage showing the day that Jimmy Elam had out there. It was incredible.

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Footage: Finn Melanson and Ethan Schalekamp. Editing: Noah Reese.