Ultrarunning
This is what happens to your body when you run the punishing Badwater 135
Ultrarunner Rhys Jenkins reveals the torturous impact the Badwater 135 had on his mind and body. From seeing hallucinatory cars dancing in the night to stripping the skin from his feet...
To take on the Badwater 135 Ultramarathon, you need to be the type that enjoys pain – as in, really, really enjoys it. And you need to be able to do so for a long period of time – approximately 40 hours, in the case of this torturous event.
Beginning in California’s Death Valley, runners push their bodies to the extreme: surviving temperatures of up to 53 degrees Celsius as they will themselves to the finish line – 135 miles (and three mountain ranges) away in the looming Mt. Whitney, CA.
The course starts 280ft below sea level at Badwater Basin – the lowest elevation point in North America. Running into the night, competitors pass through landmarks including Furnace Creek (an appropriate name given temperatures here are a scorching 30 degrees Celsius in the middle of the night) and Towne Pass (a 17-mile long ascent with 5000ft of elevation gain), before eventually reaching Whitney Portal Road – the gateway to the longest and steepest climb of the race. Here competitors climb up 5,000ft of ascent for 13 miles to the finish, after approximately 122 miles of running on what is essentially one very, very long (and hot) straight road.
Competitors must complete the race within 48 hours, which means having to run the course non-stop on little to no sleep, and must have their own support crew and vehicle. Each year, around 20 to 40 percent of competitors fail to make it to the finish line, with 16 of 96 competitors unable to complete this year's event.
One man who did manage the perilous feat, though, was ultrarunner Rhys Jenkins – the first Welshman to ever take part. Here he reveals how Badwater chew him up and spat him out...
"I could barely put my feet on the floor"
The tarmac is so hot that an egg can be fried on it
© Rhys Jenkins
Oppressive humidity and molten tarmac – literally so hot you could fry an egg on it – led to excruciating swelling in Rhys' feet.
"I had episodes where my feet were so painful that I could barely put them on the floor," he explains. "I was taking painkillers to try and reduce the pain and swelling."
A common occurrence in the Badwater field, many competitors take trainers that are half or a full size bigger as a preventative measure. Or, they perform ‘shoe surgery’ on their trainers, where they cut pieces out of the material to relieve pressure spots. When times get so unbearable, some runners even resort to flip-flops or sandals for extra relief.
“For Badwater I wore white trainers, so it wouldn’t attract the heat as much. I also took with me size 9 and 9.5 trainers. I put my bigger size trainers on, but they were so uncomfortable, it felt like putting bricks on my feet. I couldn’t wear them, so I went straight back to the car and put on my smaller trainers. Because I had been wearing them for around 100 miles, they had been worn in so my blisters could just fit in there. Weirdly, it was more comfortable than wearing a bigger size shoe.”
"I was struggling to breathe as my lungs were trying to cope with the heat and lack of humidity"
In Death Valley in July, temperatures average 47 degrees Celsius
© David McNew / Getty Images
Beginning 280ft below sea level, Death Valley is one of the hottest – and least humid – places in the US, with temperatures averaging 47 degrees Celsius in July, and humidity levels as low as 10 percent. Despite having run the race unofficially on four occasions, in the 10 years he spent laying the groundwork for his first official foray at Badwater, Rhys still struggled to acclimatise to the scorching, bone dry heat.
“The first couple of miles in I was struggling to breathe as my lungs were trying to cope with the heat and lack of humidity," explains Rhys. "While I was sweating, I was getting a layer of salt on my body. You would think at night time it would cool down but it’s still unbelievably hot, like a heatwave in the UK. It gets so hot in the day that the road holds onto the heat and then at night time it tries to release it.”
In attempt to acclimatise to Death Valley's scorching temperatures, Rhys spent eight weeks prior to the event heating training in a sauna. “Being from Wales, we get a heatwave about every 10 years so I couldn’t count on that to help me," explains Rhys. "There’s no humidity in Death Valley, so the dry heat of the sauna was perfect for heat training and it got to a point where I could do about 60 minutes in there. I would go for a run, get my heart rate up, [and] go straight into the sauna where I would stretch and do gentle exercises. I would also wear clothes in the sauna, so shorts, a t-shirt, which was made from a wetsuit-like material, and then a hoodie on top of that."
Thankfully, his training paid off: "Before where I used to panic if I started to get overheated, I just knew what to do straight away. It’s quite an intimidating place to be in, so I think 10 years is a good way of psyching yourself up for it."
"I started to question what was real and what wasn’t"
Hallucinations are commonplace at Badwater
© David McNew / Getty Images
A mixture of sleep deprivation, heatstroke and dehydration mean that vivid hallucinations are commonplace at Badwater. Despite Rhys' experience running the course on a number of occasions, nothing could prepare him for how badly this would effect him on race day.
"During my second night where I had no sleep, I started to question what was real and what wasn't," he explains. "At one point I felt as if I was falling asleep while running. There was a moment where two cars in front of me had their blinkers on at different times, so it looked like there was just one car and it was dancing in the middle of the road.”
"At one point I said I needed a nap just to switch off. So, I made this makeshift bed out of boxes. But it felt so comfy, like a hotel bed, and I put my alarm on for 20 minutes, but within 10 minutes I thought I had slept for longer and I jumped up and started legging it down the road! Those 10 minutes of sleep did me a world of good and it got me to the finish line."
“My appetite completely disappeared"
The intense heat means runners completely lose their appetite
© David McNew / Getty Images
During an ultra, runners can burn between 400-600 calories per hour and so replenishing energy is essential. However, the unforgiving heat at Badwater means that runners find it almost impossible to eat, which can lead to them 'bonking' (depleting their glycogen stores) or, even worse, hyponatremia (overhydration), as a result of low sodium levels. Symptoms of this include nausea, headaches and, in worse cases, seizures.
Fully aware of the importance of keeping fuelled, Rhys bought around 70,000 calories worth of food to Badwater with him, but eating it proved to be a perilous task. “My appetite completely disappeared," says Rhys, "and I didn’t want to eat because it was so hot. I was slowing down, and I had lost the colour in my face. At around 60 miles in, the crew sat me down at the side of the road and said, 'You are at a point where, if you don’t eat anything, you’re not going to make it.'
"My nickname growing up was ‘Burger Boy’ because I loved burgers, so my friend went to this restaurant in a nearby town and bought me a cheeseburger. Every ounce of my body did not want to eat it. I think I got a quarter of the way through before I started to feel queasy.”
“What motivated me to eat was the finish line, knowing that there is an end to this race. I chose to be there, nobody forced me. I was doing it for the CF Warriors and for the people who had donated. From that moment onwards, it was a turning point and I ran uphill for about nine miles. It was a part of the race which I wasn’t expecting to run fast so it was almost as if my body had woken up from that cheeseburger, which was about 1,000 calories, and I was good to go again.”
"I was putting on weight which is a sign of overhydration"
Rhys consumed too many electrolytes and became overhydrated
© Rhys Jenkins
Unsurprising, dehydration is a common problem running in Death Valley. However, as Rhys discovered, becoming overly concerned with keeping your fluid and electrolyte levels high, can actually result in overhydration – an equally dangerous condition.
“When I ran Badwater unofficially I experienced issues around 40 miles, where I cramped and passed out. So, at the start of this year’s race, my crew gave me two 500ml water bottles: one a salt drink called Nunn and the other plain water. He said: 'Next time you see us you need to finish both of those.' But I was seeing them every 20 minutes and I was getting through about five of those bottles every hour. About 18 miles in, the crew said that I was putting on weight which is a sign of overhydration, and that I was consuming too much salt. The plan was to stave off any cramping, so as soon as that happened, we backed off the salt and I had one bottle of water. By the time I hit 40 miles, my body was well balanced, and I went through that section feeling brilliant.”
"My feet were just covered – heels, toes, everything – in blisters"
Runners' feet can blister so badly they have to be carried off the course
© Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune / MCT via Getty Images
The combination of heat and moisture mean that insufferable blisters are one of the main reasons that runners fail to make it to the finish line. They take such a battering that, in some cases, the skin becomes separated from the bottom of the foot, with large blisters forming under the callus, as if they have been boiled in oil.
"This year I didn’t feel any pain until I took off my socks and my feet were just covered -– heels, toes, everything – in blisters," explains Rhys. "The first port of call was to cut them and get rid of the blisters as much as I could. Obviously, it was still quite painful to put my shoes back on after. I did lose a couple of toe nails as well.”
