If you run for time or the t-shirt, adventure running is not for you. Adventure runners are more interested in exploring new terrain than setting PRs, and their numbers are growing rapidly in the Blue Ridge region.

An adventure run is more of a non-competitive personal challenge than a race. Although they’re organized, adventure runs remove the red tape and costly frills—permits, awards, and sponsor mining—to get back to the essence of the sport. The trail runs are usually epic, point-to-point adventures through the mountains. Adventure runners usually have to carry their own gear, drink from creeks or springs, and largely forgo the comforts of aid stations.

“There’s more of that purist notion of competing with yourself and the adventure at hand, as opposed to the racer right next to you,” says Adam Hill, who has started an informal series of regular adventure runs in Western North Carolina. “Making your own course is a challenge, but that’s also where the enjoyment comes in. Just break out the maps and hit some trails you’ve never seen before. You get to make up your own challenge and invite some people to go along with you.”

Hill puts together one run a month, ranging in distance from 15 to over 60 miles. On October 6, a pack of around two-dozen rugged runners will attempt his most sadistic creation, the Mount Pitchell 100K. The run starts at the summit of Mount Pisgah and follows the white-dotted Mountains to Sea Trail for 67 miles all the way to the summit of Mount Mitchell—the East Coast’s highest peak. Pitchell's total cumulative climb adds up to 16,000 feet. To add to the adventure, the run starts at midnight.

“It started in the spirit of adventure,” Hill says of Pitchell. “During training runs my friends and I would say 'let’s just go from point A to point B and see if we can make it.' I live about a mile from the Mountains to Sea Trail, so one day I decided to run out of my back door and up to Mount Mitchell.”

Some of these adventure runs are multi-day point-to-point endeavors. In early August, Eric Grossman, elite trail runner and race director of the rugged Iron Mountain 50-Mile ultra in Damascus, Va., organized an impromptu six-day stage run on Appalachian Trail (A.T.) from Erwin, Tenn., to Grayson Highlands State Park. Seven people started with Grossman on the run that covered between 15-35 miles a day. The long days saw over 8,000 feet of elevation gain through the unforgiving summit crossings of the A.T. in the Roan and Grayson Highlands—some of the tallest peaks in the Blue Ridge. Grossman and company met family members at their camping spots at the end of each day, but they were still forced to carry all of the food and water treatment they would need for each stage.

“I organize a regular race, but this is just much more fun,” says Grossman. “There’s no collecting money or assuming responsibility. It was just seven guys heading out on the trail. That made it more enjoyable.”

But the lack of organization or, in this case, a course time limit had some repercussions for Mike Day, who runs the website NC Ultra (www.ncultra.org). Day decided to slow his pace on one of the longer stages and ended up miles short of the campground at nightfall. After realizing he left his headlamp in his bag with his family the previous night, he was forced to stop and spend a night in the dark woods without shelter.

“The stage run was not all fun and games,” Day said in a post-race report. “I had to bivouac seven miles from the end of the stage.”

Over Labor Day weekend another group of adventure runners finished the first Appalachian Crossing. The route traversed the Eastern Continental Divide through West Virginia’s most rugged mountains, from the Tygart Valley River watershed to the Potomac River. With a course that had limited direction marks, orienteering was a big part of the endeavor. The run started at the base of the western slope of Cheat Mountain and headed east to eventually drop off the Allegheny Front down to the Potomac. From there, the run journeyed back up to the top of Shenandoah Mountain and the West Virginia state line.

The four-day, 120-mile journey was created by Dan Lehman of the West Virginia Mountain Trail Runners. Lehman decided to combine his passion for running with an interest in orienteering. Lehman mapped out the entire route of the Crossing over a period of two years. To create the route, he linked trails with a few roads and old unused railroad grades from the early 1900s.

“People obviously run at different speeds, but the idea of this was to run well each day at your own pace,” Lehman says. “It’s fun to use this model of non-competitive running without the sponsors and the fees. There’s also a different kind of challenge in the lack of aid and the navigation. There’s intrigue in having to find your own way.”

Lehman supplied each of the 20 people that ran with a map that he made. He required runners to stay together in at least groups of two. The group crossed the highest point in West Virginia, the 4,862-foot summit of Spruce Knob, before heading over the Divide.

In the spirit of adventure running, Lehman doesn’t plan to hold the Crossing annually. Although he doesn’t fully discount a return in years ahead, more immediately he plans to create new destination running options.

“People can get burned out on the same events year after year,” he says. “I like the idea of having more spontaneous, unique events to look forward to.”

—Jedd Ferris

Run for the Adventure

Forget entry fees and aid stations—just run for fun. Feel free to choose your own route and just go for a new adventure, but if you require the power of suggestion, here are a few upcoming semi-organized adventure runs in the Blue Ridge:

October 6—Pitchell 100K & Folk Art Center 50K—This is the annual foot odyssey between Mt. Pisgah and Mt. Mitchell. Start atop the summit of Pisgah at midnight, and begin a trek to the highest mountaintop east of the Rockies. The companion Folk Art Center 50K starts at 6am that morning, and boasts a cumulative elevation gain of about 11,000 feet. ultra_rnr@yahoo.com.

November 4—Bridge and Trestle 17-Mile Guerrilla Run—Another no-frills run with no aid and no awards. Just the satisfaction of slogging up Virginia’s brutal Iron Mountain from the town of Damascus. schoborg@etsu.edu.

November 17—Bent Creek Gobbler—This Asheville, N.C., run features two 16-mile loops in figure eight style that will give everyone the option of doing one or two loops, a great tour of Bent Creek on singletrack, some doubletrack, and a little bit of gravel road. ultra_rnr@yahoo.com.

December TBA—Art Loeb Trail Adventure Run—One of the first adventure runs in the region, this aid-free annual run that starts near Brevard, N.C., covers 32 miles on the Art Loeb Trail. The mountains will be cold and possibly icy, but that means the creek water will be that much more refreshing. ultra_rnr@yahoo.com.