Outpeople: Ultrarunner sets Appalachian Trail speed record

On Monday at 3:38 a.m., professional ultrarunner Karl “Speedgoat” Meltzer, 48, emerged from the Appalachian Trail’s southern terminus at Springer Mountain, Georgia, to set an Appalachian Trail supported thru-hike speed record of 45 days 22 hours and 38 minutes.

Meltzer started on Aug. 3 from Mt. Katahdin, Maine, and averaged 47 miles a day. The time beat the record set in 2015 by Scott Jurek by 10 hours.

Meltzer is a world-class ultrarunner who holds the record for the most career wins in 100-mile races, including five Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Runs and six Wasatch Front 100-Mile Endurance Runs. The Red Bull-sponsored athlete made previous speed record attempts on the Appalachian Trail in 2008 and 2014.

The project, in planning for more than two years, was accomplished with a small core crew and others who traveled alongside Meltzer every day, providing him with food, water, medical attention and logistical support. Meals were prepared and taken in a van where Meltzer also slept.

“For the crew, enduring 46 days of this was probably harder for them than it was for me,” Meltzer said.

Meltzer’s time on the trail typically began around 5 a.m. and ended between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. with several big meals during the day consisting of steak, fried chicken, ice cream, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, hamburgers, steamed vegetables, pasta, Red Bull and beer (at dinner).

Meltzer reportedly averaged 60-70 minutes between the time he came off the trail and when he went to sleep; on a few occasions he slept on the trail itself rather than in his support van.

By the numbers, Meltzer took 4.2 million steps, burned 345,100 calories (7,500 per day on average), ran for 678 hours (14.8 per day on average) and trashed 20 pairs of shoes.

A satellite-linked SPOT tracker reported his location every 2-3 minutes.

The journey is chronicled online at redbull.com/atrun. A camera crew traveled with Meltzer and a documentary film will be released in 2017.

The Appalachian Trail runs from Maine to Georgia, stretching 2,190 miles through 14 states. It is roughly the distance between Los Angeles and Cincinnati, Ohio, as the crow flies.

A thru-hiker will experience 464,500 feet of elevation change, or 16 climbs of Mt. Everest.

Thousands of people attempt an Appalachian Trail thru-hike every year, yet only one in four hikers finishes the journey. Backpackers typically take 5-7 months to complete the entire trail, according to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy.