Elizabeth's Furnace 50km
Report and Results
March 13, 2010

Back to: Elizabeth Furnace 50k Page

Report

Photos by: Stephanie Wilson | Doug Sullivan

For those who had the pleasure of being there for the 2010 "running" of the Elizabeths Furnace 50km, it was truly an epic event that will not be forgotten. The winter of 2010 dropped a highly unusual amount of snow in the mid-Atlantic region, and the Massanutten Mountains/Fort Valley area of NW Virginia was no exception. A week before the Elizabeths Furnace race, portion of the course had still been in under as much as a foot or more of snow, but a warm and then rainy week cleared the course of all but trace amounts of snow pack. This big melt, combined with some steady rains, led to rather wet conditions for the runners on race day.

In some places, "wet" didn’t even begin to describe what the runners were encountering. The runners knew they were in for a bigger challenge than they had envisioned within minutes of the start. While making their initial climb up the notoriously dry and rocky Signal Knob trail, a normally innocuous section surprised the runners with a knee deep stream crossing, at a point along the trail where no one had previously been aware that there was a stream. One runner, Mike Bailey, was reported to have graciously planted himself in the middle of the crossing to assist all the runners behind him safely across. This type of concern for the other runners was to be demonstrated numerous times over as the day went on.

A series of five stream crossings about 10 miles or so into the run, at the end of the Mudhole Gap trail section, were so challenging that the first female finisher, Stephanie Wilson, was moved to describe this section (and the race as a whole) as "Primal Quest 2010." Every runner had his or her own exciting story to tell about surviving the torrents of water in Mudhole Gap. Fortunately, everyone emerged in one piece – of nearly equal good fortune, some runners were carrying cameras. So we have pictures of some of the conditions, and of how the runners banded together to get across the stream sections and on to the rest of the course.

The eventual overall winner was David Frazier of nearby Harrisonburg, Virginia. David broke away from eventual 2nd and 3rd place finishers Greg Zaruba and Brad Hinton during the infamous Sherman Gap loop over the last 9 miles of the Elizabeth Furnace course. David was also the only runner observed to stay on the course at all times – he exited the last 100 foot section of the Shawl Gap section of the trail at mile 30 after moving through chest-to-neck-deep high water, water that had risen from the Passage Creek that on this day was literally roaring through the Fort Valley. Of the 56 runners for this year’s event, 32 finished the full 50km distance. The other 31 finishers aside from David chose to bushwhack around the flooded section of trail near the end.

Results

NameSexAgeStateElizabethsFinishDistanceTime 50Time Other
David FrazierMale24VA 11:11 12:5050 km 5:50 
Greg ZarubaMale43MD 11:11 12:5750 km 5:57 
Brad HintonMale33VA 11:11 0:0050 km 5:58 
Michael HuffMale42VA 11:38 1:4750 km 6:47 
Jack KuriskyMale42VA  2:3050 km 7:30 
Marlin YoderMale56VA 12:11 2:3450 km 7:34 
Jim DanielsMale36VA 12:12 2:3550 km 7:35 
Stephanie WilsonFemale45VA 12:11 2:3550 km 7:35 
Michele HarmonFemale44MD 12:25 2:4350 km 7:43 
Joe ClapperMale51MD 12:25 2:4350 km 7:43 
Ted BielawaMale39VA 12:12 2:4450 km 7:44 
Zsuzsanna CarlsonFemale37NJ 12:25 2:5050 km 7:50 
Victor LinMale30VA 12:24 2:5350 km 7:53 
Bill BreidenstineMale44PA 12:29 2:5450 km 7:54 
Gary LukacsMale52PA 12:24 2:5650 km 7:56 
Mike BaileyMale28VA 12:25 2:5850 km 7:58 
Tom SimondsMale55VA 12:32 3:0750 km 8:07 
David QuiveyMale47VA 12:36 3:1550 km 8:15 
Alisa SpringmanFemale35PA 12:36 3:1550 km 8:15 
Vicki KendallFemale57VA 12:54 3:2550 km 8:25 
Janice HeltibridleFemale52VA 12:41 3:2950 km 8:29 
David GaudetteMale52VA 12:55 3:3550 km 8:35 
Rhonda StricklettFemale35MD 1:13 4:1050 km 9:10 
Alan GowenMale60MD 1:13 4:1050 km 9:10 
Jeff BestMale48VA 1:55 4:4150 km 9:41 
Scott MillarMale41MD 1:55 4:4150 km 9:41 
Farouk ElkassedMale60VA 1:22 4:4450 km 9:44 
John GodinetMale53MD 1:55 4:4450 km 9:44 
Doug SullivanMale48MD 1:00 5:0150 km 10:01 
Rob DolanMale43VA 1:48 5:1450 km 10:14 
Bill WandelMale66MD 2:07 5:3050 km 10:30 
Nelson StritehoffMale58MD 2:01 5:4950 km 10:49 
Kerry OwensFemale28DCX 2:3127 miles6:45 * 
Jaret SeibergMale40MDX 2:3127 miles6:45 * 
Laura BurFemale30MD 12:18 12:3023 miles  5:30
Marc GriffinMale34VA 12:36 12:5023 miles  5:50
Bruce TweedieMale48VA 1:13 1:3023 miles  6:30
Andrew AndersonMale29VAX 12:2722 miles  5:27
John NelsonMale59VAX 1:0622 miles  6:06
Matt BakerMale28VAX 1:0822 miles  6:08
David SnipesMale42VAX 1:0822 miles  6:08
Adam MathesonMale30VAX 1:0822 miles  6:08
Linda GaudetteFemale46VAX 1:2822 miles  6:28
Lisa JohnstonFemale45MDX 2:1922 miles  7:19
Kathryn ButlerFemale37MDX 2:1922 miles  7:19
Challen EdwardsFemale43VAX 2:1922 miles  7:19
Caroline WilliamsFemale48VAX 4:1822 miles +  9:18
John GuendelsbergerMale58VA 10:45 1:4421 miles  6:44
Carter WieckingFemale40VA 10:45 1:4421 miles  6:44
Jill QuiveyFemale44VA 10:20 1:1820.5 miles  6:18
Gaynor BourgeoisFemale41DC    12 miles  Unknown
Marti KovenerFemale45MD    12 miles  Unknown
Sunny FitzgeraldFemale54MD    12 miles  Unknown
Eva PastalkovaFemale34VA  12:07    Unknown
Thomas GreenMale59MD        Unknown
C J BlaggMale43VA    8 miles  Unknown