Siobhan Milner

My favorite Barkley stat is that more people have visited the Moon (24) than finished five laps and touched the yellow gate (20). With due apologies to humanity, I'm kinda cheering for the course this year 😈 #bm100

PhD Timeline xkcd.com/3081

“Are we witnessing the beginning of the end for fossil fuels?”

This is a brilliant podcast on the possibility that we are starting to see the decline of fossil fuels.

Highly recommended 👍🏻

Outrage and Optimism - The Climate Podcast

#ThereIsHope

open.spotify.com/episode/0rK4...

They're going after Parkrun again, you know, that event where lots of people of all ages, abilities and genders run around a local park and it not, in any form, a race?

Biggest commitment to a 3 second joke I've ever seen

Episode 52: Tim Landy – Barkley Marathons 2025 Podcast Episode · British Ultra Running Podcast · 03/30/2025 · 1h 21m

Tim Landy on his impressive 1 loop + 11 book outing at #bm100 podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/b...

I have been remiss in not posting this but the #BM100 and the #BFC50k exist because of Frozen Head State Park. This is our opportunity to show our appreciation and help support the work of the park. Please consider donating. tnstateparksconservancy.org/my-tn-state-...

A secret: Being tough gets easier the fitter you are.

When you are 'out of shape', the alarm bell in your head goes off at the slightest sensation of discomfort. When you are fit or prepared, the alarm is quiet for much longer, only gradually increasing as discomfort grows.

Lazarus Lake (70) is back on his trek across the United States. After stopping last year in Oklahoma, he's returned to the road - facing harsh wind, rain, and injuries. #lazcon 2025

Retweeting to listen to later!

Another classic Barkley T-shirt. Have a good Friday Out There!!

#Motivation #ultrarunning #lazbook

Just a bit too cute not to share 🐘 Map courtesy of Tim Lewin

Barkley debrief from Laz page 1 Lazarus Lake 4h • 0 barkley debriefing to say the course won this year is an understatement. and since the smoke cleared, revealing a battlefield littered with the corpses of hubris and overconfidence i have been thinking back over the past year and especially the past week seeking to understand what went wrong... and i came out with some definite opinions about what triggered the massacre of 2025. that doesn't mean i am right but i think the cat ass trophies of 2025 can be greatly attributed to a few mistakes repeated by a lot of athletes. sure, the course got tweaked. it gets tweaked every year. and i knew going in that this was a difficult barkley course. but, while it had a little more climb it was also shorter. i was actually not certain we would not have another mass finish! but in the leadup to the race i saw errors being committed that lowered my optimism for the field. 1) taking bad advice. i saw it written over and over, until it took on a life of its own. "follow a veteran"

Barkley debrief from Laz page 2 better to develop your own navigational skills. how do you know the veteran you follow did not become a veteran by following veterans? and even if you latch on to someone with serious navigation skills if they leave you out in the woods, all that happened was that they led you a long way from safety and the main thing you learned was what the right direction looks like when someone's ass is in the middle of it! 2) take a picture of the map, and retreat to your own tent to copy it. that one is so stupid we arent even going to allow it next year. first, it is going to be nearly impossible to mark the checkpoints accurately from a phone picture. if you make it small enough to see where the mark is, you cannot tell the exact location. if you make it large enough to see the exact location, you cannot see enough of the whole map to see where it goes. and exact placement of the checkpoint locations is critical! second, what everyone lost was the discussion that normally goes on around the master map. following a veteran might be a fools errand. having them tell you what to look for when locating checkpoints or selecting your routes can be worth its weight in gold. which gets back to navigation and the checkpoints. i don't think the athletes realized how critical it is to: mark the checkpoints accurately navigate to them.

Barkley debrief from Laz page 3 great pains are taken to place the marks on the exact location of the checkpoint. and i think many of the athletes with rudimentary navigation skills are unable to look at the map and exactly visualize a location. contour lines are not merely a record of elevation change. they are a picture of how the ground is configured. what i kept hearing was; "i shot a bearing" shooting a bearing is the most rudimentary form of navigation. if it is not pitch black night, or white-out fog i would not use a compass to navigate at frozen head. i would look at the map and match the contours with my surroundings. then, instead of a straight line through all obstacles i would pick the best route to reach my destination. old trails and logging roads are easy to follow. in the absence of human-made routes if you look at the contours for the "easiest" route you are almost certain to find game trails going the same way. animals always choose the easiest route to go from here to there, that is how game trails are formed. and game trails also take out a lot of the briars and undergrowth. there is an additional benefit to following the contours. you know what the ground should look like as you approach the location. we heard a lot of known excellent navigators comment that they passed clusters of virgins "turning over every rock" nowhere near the next checkpoint. no amount of searching will help if you cannot identify the checkpoint locations!

Barkley debrief from Laz page 4 3) trying to brute force error correction. some people searched for checkpoints for as much as 5 hours, going back and forth over the same ground. then came home with a description that did not sound like they were ever in the vicinity of the actual checkpoint! checkpoints are not "hidden" they are not probably in plain sight, and they have to be placed where hogs cannot get to them. but the map markings and directions are intended to make them easy to locate. in a race with zero margin for error, i would not look more than 5 minutes before consulting the map. find a nearby landmark that is easily identifiable. or even a couple of more distant peaks that you can see... if these do not match what you should see from the checkpoint, then you are searching in the wrong place! my conclusion about the weekend is not that kind. but sometimes what you need to hear and what you want to hear are not the same. barkley is out there on the edge of possibility. but it is not impossible. for most athletes the 100 is not going to be in their future. the best ability, preparation, and execution might not be enough. but most of them should have been able to knock out one loop under the time limit! the 2025 field left a lot of cards on the table.

Barkley debrief from Laz 👌🏻

#BM100

A very old Soviet joke, from an especially dark time:

Foxes are fleeing the USSR in droves.
Q: Why are you running away?
Fox: The Soviets passed a new law that they’re going to arrest all camels.
Q: But you’re foxes!
Fox: Yeah, why don’t *you* try proving to the NKVD that you’re not a camel.

Get your bedroom conditions right: coolish (18 degrees Celsius / 64,5 Fahrenheit), dark, and quiet

Try and maintain a fixed sleep / wake schedule (go to bed and get up at the same time daily, within about an hour of that time)

No difficult conversations or studying right before bedtime

Reminders for athletes for good sleep: no coffee, tobacco, alcohol or training less than 4 hours before bed (the last once is obviously difficult in tournament situations but we control what we can control)

“Only 30% of nutrition claims in a reputable newspaper are supported by evidence” - Asker Jeukendrup yesterday at the Leaders in Performance ConferenceXL at Papendal

The founder of Signal releases a response to SignalGate:

“There are so many great reasons to be on Signal.

Now including the opportunity for the vice president of the United States of America to randomly add you to a group chat for coordination of sensitive military operations.”

And since I'm in the business of posting #BM100 documentaries now, here's a recent french one. You can make youtube auto generate and auto translate subtitles into english www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLnB...

‘60 hours of hell’: hardship is the only way forward at the Barkley Marathons More crucible than race, the Barkley Marathons in the hostile backwoods of Tennessee remains the world’s toughest footrace, where change, adaptation and the struggle to survive play out

www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/m...

YouTube video by Singletrack The Barkley Strikes Back: 2025's Brutal Return to Form

Already a proper edited video on this year's Barkley! www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezjz... #BM100

‘60 hours of hell’: hardship is the only way forward at the Barkley Marathons More crucible than race, the Barkley Marathons in the hostile backwoods of Tennessee remains the world’s toughest footrace, where change, adaptation and the struggle to survive play out

www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/m... Loved this. Looking forward to Jared’s book. #bm100

From Sébastien’s report:

There were 16 books this year, the most ever.

Ratjaw is still only climbed in CCW loops.

2 big climbs were added, one is ball bearing hill, the other is probably a previously removed one brought back.
#bm100

To say Laz over corrected ignores the history. After John Kelly finished in 2017, it took another five years before anyone finished. Whenever the bar is raised, a readjustment period follows. It’s the way of living on the edge.

#loveparkrun #BartleyPark #BartleyParkparkrun #Totton #ukrunchat #BM100

Kelly Haupin sharing a bit about her #bm100

One common thread through the #bm100 runner reports is temperature issues. Sebastien, Aurélien and John have all written about really struggling with cramps and dehydration in the loop 1 heat.

I saw someone say evidence was that heat didn't stop finishes; we may have found a limit to this.

Latest podcast episode - Squat, Bench and Deadlift Mythbusting with Tristan Jacobs. Find it everywhere you find your favourite podcasts: open.spotify.com/episode/64rz... #powerlifting #strength #strengthtraining