{"id":304,"date":"2024-09-26T04:22:00","date_gmt":"2024-09-26T04:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/?p=304"},"modified":"2025-09-28T00:02:51","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T00:02:51","slug":"new-speed-record-set-by-a-woman-for-completing-the-appalachian-trail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/?p=304","title":{"rendered":"New speed record (set by a woman) for completing the Appalachian Trail"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Tara<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Amazing. I’ve excerpted come stuff below the link but if you are into big sports accomplishments hit the link for the whole story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the most grueling records in American endurance sports fell late Saturday night in northern Georgia. Tara Dower, a 31-year-old ultrarunner and long-distance hiker born in North Carolina and based in Virginia, reached Georgia\u2019s Springer Mountain, the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail, at 11:53 P.M. She completed the arduous southern thru-hike of the iconic trail, crossing 14 states and 2,197 miles, in 40 days, 18 hours, and 5 minutes. It\u2019s the fastest known time for hiking the iconic trail in either direction.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her finishing time cleaves approximately 13 hours off the 2018 benchmark set by Belgian runner Karel Sabbe, who in 2018 hiked the trail from south to north. It also returns the overall <\/strong>record to a woman for the first time since 2015, when Scott Jurek eclipsed Jennifer Pharr Davis\u2019 then-record<\/a> by only three hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cThe number of people that have hiked the Appalachian Trail before Tara in less than 50 days is ten, only one of them a woman,\u201d explained Liz Derstine, who set the women\u2019s record for a northbound hike in 2020 at 51 days and joined Dower for a stretch of the trail earlier this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnd Tara has done it faster than all of them, including the men,\u201d Derstine added. \u201cThis is one of the greatest achievements of all time. It\u2019s huge.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Appalachian Trail guru Warren Doyle<\/a> told me that one of Dower\u2019s secrets to success was her consistent speed on the trail. On most days she hiked slower than Sabbe\u2019s pace, he said, but she traversed more total miles. \u201cShe put in longer workdays,\u201d Doyle explained Friday, just as Dower neared the North Carolina-Georgia border. \u201cI hope this puts it to rest: It\u2019s not about speed. It\u2019s about endurance. It\u2019s not the Fastest Known Time. It\u2019s the Shortest Known Time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In recent years, as the popularity of FKT attempts have grown, corporate sponsorships and larger support crews on trail have become de rigueur. Dower, however, kept her posse small, with only her mother, Debbie Komlo, and a hiker she befriended on the AT in 2019, Megan \u201cRascal\u201d Wilmarth, joining her the entire time. (Multiple other hikers others paced her or arrived at assorted trailheads to offer help, but they came and went.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dower and Wilmarth slept in a Ford Transit van nicknamed \u201cBurly,\u201d while Komlo trailed them in her Dodge Durango. They worked relentlessly to get her in bed by 10 P.M. and up at 3 A.M., feeding her upwards of 10,000 calories each day. They also replenished Dower\u2019s massive snack box of, as Komlo put it, \u201cnot a lot of healthy stuff\u201d with Rice Krispies Treats, Twizzlers, Gushers. Four times a day, Dower downed a 320-calorie protein shake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt stops, we just shoveled food into her face,\u201d Wilmarth told me. \u201cWe\u2019d always have a sit-down meal, but, of course, she wouldn\u2019t sit down.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Amazing. I’ve excerpted come stuff below the link but if you are into big sports accomplishments hit the link for the whole story. One of the most grueling records in American endurance sports fell late Saturday night in northern Georgia. Tara Dower, a 31-year-old ultrarunner and long-distance hiker born in North Carolina and based in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=304"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11132,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions\/11132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}