Guest Post by Eric Senseman
The Black Canyon 100k takes place on the Black Canyon Trail in Arizona, a north-to-south, point-to-point trail through the foothills of the Bradshaw Mountains. It starts about 75 miles south of Flagstaff and ends just north of Phoenix. Like most any point-to-point trail, the elevation at one end isn’t the same as the elevation at the other end. In the case of the Black Canyon Trail, the north trailhead sits at about 4,200 feet above sea level and the southern terminus rests around 1,900 feet. The 100k itself runs north-to-south, so the course accumulates a net downhill. Flowing downhill through the Black Canyon is the Agua Fria River, a roughly 120-mile waterway that slows to a trickle in the summer and rages with run-off from downpours and snowmelt other times of the year. The river swells so ferociously and quickly that it caused a course re-route of the 2017 race due to flash flooding. But in the desert a wet rainy day is much rarer than a sizzling afternoon under the sun. Even in February, the Black Canyon can heat up to 90 degrees Fahrenheit. The many cacti—saguaros and ocotillos and chollas—easily endure the rain and heat and don’t seem to mind one or the other.
Ultrarunners—unlike the cacti—do mind the heat and the rain. Heat slows our pace and might dehydrate us; rain muddies our footing and could cause us to slip. And that’s the beauty of running the Black Canyon 100k: you might get squashed by the heat or you could fall in the mud. February in the desert could bring nearly any kind of weather. Setting the weather aside, the dynamics of the Black Canyon Trail offer an eclectic mix of terrain that could pulverize your quads with its downhills or seize your hip flexors with its tight twists and turns and subtle ups and downs. I’m choosing to run the Black Canyon 100k for a third time because those unknown weather variables are always changing, showing off the area in a different light each time. I’m running it for the third time because the 62 miles of trail—no matter how many times I run them in training and racing—never bore me: the trail’s constant variation makes every run an intimate dance between trail and trail runner.
The race’s origin is due to Aravaipa Running’s Jamil Coury. He familiarized himself with the trail, began to love the trail, and then dreamed of organizing a race on the trail. Once you’ve run the Black Canyon Trail, you can understand why Jamil grew fond of it, and why he’s since devoted a lot of his time to starting, nurturing, and growing the Black Canyon Ultras. It seems the trail was destined to eventually house the country’s biggest, and perhaps most competitive, 100k race. The trail itself is almost exactly 62 miles long. The point-to-point nature of the trail makes sense—by running the trail, you actually get somewhere. And in getting you somewhere, the trail meanders along mesas with stunning views of the Bradshaw Mountains; it dives into gorges and rises out of drainages; it dips into canyons and soars toward the desert’s brilliant blue sky. Like a lion in a zoo being gawked at by visitors, the Black Canyon Trail struts its stuff. It shows off because, like the lion in the zoo, it knows it demands attention. So much so that the trail was designated a National Recreation Trail in 2008 and, in 2012, Bicycling named it Arizona’s best bike ride. Not many trails have been so acclaimed.
The race was first run in 2014 and, according to UltraSignup, had 42 finishers and a winning time of over 10 hours. Now the course record stands at 7:52:26 and the entrant’s list for this year’s race has ballooned to nearly 700 runners. It’s no wonder that interest in the race has boomed: aside from a badass course, the race has offered four automatic entries into the Western States 100 since 2015, and it’s a qualifier for the Western States 100 lottery. From its humble beginnings, the Black Canyon 100k has become a premier event, and it’s more than likely to continue that way with Jubilee Paige serving as the race director—along with the dozens and dozens of volunteers, and personnel from the Bureau of Land Management, that tend to aid stations and man road crossings all day in the unforgiving desert.
I trained really hard for the race this year because I want to win it. I want to win it because I’m competitive. I want to win it because I want to gain entry into the 2019 Western States 100. But more than all those things combined, I want to win it because this is my home turf. In the aggregate, I’ve run the full course at least four times between racing and training runs. I know the course intimately. When you train enough in a place, you absorb a small part of that place and take it with you. You develop a loyalty for the place and a devotion to it. And when you run in a place enough, you want to be the master of that terrain. You want to be the place’s caring steward and celebrated champion. At least that’s what I want, and those are the emotions that the Black Canyon Trail evokes in me.
When the race starts at 7:00am on February 16th, remember that a lot of people worked really hard to make the race possible: from the pioneers that built the trail, to the pioneer that started a race on the trail, to the many people whose love for the trail leads them to run it a lot, or volunteer at the race, or donate money for the trail’s upkeep. As you navigate the winding single-track trail through the scenic Arizona desert, enjoy it. Once you cross the finish line at the Emery Henderson Trailhead, relish it. Despite its seemingly benign profile and picturesque appeal, the Black Canyon Trail will make you earn every mile. If those enduring cacti could laugh, they would, because they know it’s best to keep still in the desert. What those cacti don’t know is that running the Black Canyon Trail is a must for any ultrarunner and, as such, so too, is running the Black Canyon 100k.