200-mile Tahoe trail run fills up in 1 week
By Heidi Mills, Outdoor
Back when race director Candice Burt first dreamed up a 200-mile trail run around Lake Tahoe, she figured it would take time to build an audience for such an over-the-top concept. Its culmination, the Tahoe 200, will be in early September. At a price tag of $850, the run gives hopefuls a full 100 hours to complete its rugged course.
Burt needn’t have worried about instant success: after the event had been open to applicants for only a week, 187 runners entered the lottery for one of just 75 available spots. And if the U.S. Forest Service renews its permit going forward, Burt thinks she can easily attract 200 racers yearly.
While most Americans probably can’t even imagine running 200 miles, a small contingency of runners seems eager to go the distance. In Europe, the 5-year-old Tor des Geants, a 330-kilometer (that’s 205 miles, for the metric-averse) point-to-point race in the Italian Alps, fills all 660 slots immediately. If registration for the Tor des Geants and the Tahoe 200 is a reliable indicator, there’s an unmet demand for point-to-point 200’s.