Team Backyard Ultra World Champs still going after 100 hours
Four Belgian runners have been running for more than 100 hours (670km), and they show no signs of stopping
Photo by:
Dave Dupéré
The 2024 Team Backyard Ultra World Championships, an endurance event unlike any other, has entered its 100th hour, with four Belgian runners still battling it out, having completed more than 650K. This unique race format, invented by Gary Cantrell (a.k.a. Laz Lake), pits athletes against the clock as much as each other and challenges participants to complete a 6.706 km loop every hour, on the hour, until only one runner remains.
Note: this story was updated on Oct. 25.
Belgian runners persevere
The rules of the backyard ultra are simple, yet brutal: if you fail to complete the loop within the hour, you’re out. The last person standing is declared the winner, while everyone else receives a “Did Not Finish” result. The current world record from the team edition of the event is 101 hours, set by Belgium’s Merijn Geerts and Ivo Steyaert in 2022. Geerts and Steyaert are among the four athletes still running, and there’s a good chance this mark could be broken. The 2023 edition of the individual championships, held every second year, featured American runner Harvey Lewis logging 108 laps, or 724.248 km in total—to shatter the previous backyard ultra world record by more than 40 km, with Canadian ultrarunner Ihor Verys assisting him and completing 107 loops, more than 717 km.
Team Canada sets new records
After an incredible 68 hours of continuous racing in Edmundston, N.B., Nova Scotia’s Lee Alonzo Murphy emerged as the champion of the Canadian Backyard Ultra, completing 456 km on the 6.7-km loop. Murphy shattered his personal record of 54 hours, and his sense of humour and lighthearted approach (including a memorable shirtless lap at midnight on his birthday) shone through until the end. Quebec’s Éric Deshaies served as Murphy’s assist, and took a DNF when he couldn’t complete his 68th lap due to a foot problem. Ontario’s Amanda Nelson also pushed her limits, completing 60 laps (402.4 km), breaking her personal record of 57 loops—she has gone farther than any other Canadian woman in a backyard ultra-style event.
Alleged rule violations by Team Canada
Despite Team Canada’s strong performance, Alberta’s Matt Shepard made the difficult decision to withdraw after 44 yards—not due to fatigue, but out of concern for what he perceived as lax rule enforcement by race director Yvan L’Heureux. While he praised the event as “the best we’ve had so far,” he ultimately stepped back after Quebec’s Pierre-Alexandre Beaulieu allegedly broke a key rule by dropping his jacket after the bell at the top of a lap.
“It’s not the racers, but the race officials that are responsible for this,” Shepard explained, noting that he confirmed the infraction via video replay after being alerted by teammates. He emphasized the importance of strict adherence to the rules: “This has historically been an issue every year, one of the rules that must be black and white.”
Shepard felt that addressing these concerns is vital for the integrity of the competition. “The RD told him to continue running, because the risk of being caught for something so simple is much less than the reward of points he would add to the Canadian team,” he said. While he was physically capable of continuing, Shepard wanted to ensure that everyone involved was on the same page regarding the rules. “I’ve been in this game a long time, and it hurts me,” he shared. “Maybe a third-party referee is needed?”
Canadian Running reached out to Cantrell, creator of the event and of the backyard ultra racing format, for a comment on the Team Canada situation, after some people connected to the event implied that he suggested race organizers let it pass. “No, I wouldn’t have said that,” he told us. “I would’ve never been foggy enough to do that. But I would also have not been able to be clear,” given that he was, himself, directing the U.S. race at the time he took a call from Team Canada, and isn’t sure how long he’d been up without sleeping.
He added that he later felt it was a mistake to take the call, given that he had no first-hand knowledge of what happened, and that it would be up to the local race director’s discretion whether a disqualification was called for. “If things happen and they don’t get seen at the time and it comes up later, we do whatever is appropriate,” he said, implying that there could still be disqualifications. “We don’t make a public statement,” he added. “We’re not out to embarrass anybody.”
Video of the event is available on YouTube, here.
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