The Bear 100 -- Endurance Trails of Color 

In 1999, northern Utah trout farmer and winner of the Wasatch Front 100 
(WF100), Leland Barker, must have thought that as tough and beautiful 
as the WF100 course is, it was missing something -- color! The WF100 is 
run in early September, after the carpet of colorful wildflowers have 
dried up and before the leaves of the abundant maples and aspens have 
turned to beautiful shades of red and yellow. Two weeks after the 1999 
WF100, Leland introduced The Bear 100 - an equally challenging course 
in the northern Wasatch Range of southern Idaho at a time when the 
autumn colors of the area were at their peak. 

From the first time I heard of The Bear, I've wanted to try it. 
However, I had taken on the challenge of the WF100 first and was too 
new to running ultras to try to run The Bear 2 to 3 weeks afterwards. 
The WF100 course defeated me in 1999, but I came back to finish the 
next 2 years, first with a finish in Sundance and last year at Midway. 
I met Leland at the 2001 WF100 pre-race meeting and told him then I had 
made the decision to skip the Wasatch Front 100 in 2002 and instead run 
The Bear. I'm very happy I did! Leland, by the way, won the WF100 in 
2001 as well. 

Unlike most 100 mile races, The Bear is run from Friday morning to 
Saturday instead of from Saturday morning to Sunday. To get to the 
race, I flew into Salt Lake City on Thursday, where I picked up a 
rental car to drive approximately 80 miles north of Salt Lake City, 
through Brigham City and Logan to Leland's Mountain Valley Trout Farm 2 
miles west of Smithfield, Utah. I needed to checkin, pick up my race 
packet, and prepare my drop bags before the 5:00 pm pre-race meeting. 
The drive was a good prelude to what was to come. Unlike the mountains 
of northern California which are covered thickly with chaparral, a 
combination of scrub oaks, chamise, toyon, and coyote brush, plants 
which are ever green; the mountains of northern Utah and southern Idaho 
are covered thickly with what I would call, scrub maples, the leaves of 
which turn to striking shades of red and orange, when the autumn frosts 
hit. The road from Brigham City to Logan is bordered on both sides by 
such mountains making it a marvelous ride, well worth the trip in 
itself! 

Arriving at the Mountain Valley Trout Farm, I immediately started to 
recognize old friends and acquaintances. It makes for a very warm 
welcome, something I've never felt at any of hundreds of shorter events 
I ran prior to getting into ultras. It is comforting to see others who, 
like yourself, were willing to travel long distances for the adventure, 
the challenge, and the love for being out on the trails. Everyone has a 
lot of respect for each other no matter whether they are at the head, 
middle, or back of the pack, or aren't able to finish. We couldn't do 
what we do without all of the support from each other and the many 
volunteers who make it possible. Whenever you do something that is very 
difficult you tend to build a strong bond with those who do it with you 
and running a mountainous 100 miles certainly falls into that category. 

The setting for the pre-race meeting itself is very interesting. 
Leland's house sits on a grassy knoll with trees surrounded by many 
ponds interconnected by a myriad of cement holding pools and channels, 
that look old enough to have been built by the Romans, all teeming with 
large trout. At the pre-race meeting, Leland tells us that there will 
be no weigh in today or during the race, because the only scales he 
has, for fish, only go up to 30 lbs. We are on our own to look out for 
gaining or losing too much. The biggest question is: will in rain? The 
forecast calls for 60% chance on Saturday. We will all cross our 
fingers that it stays dry. At the end of the briefing, they drew bib-
numbers of winners of a generous number of Petzel and Black Diamond LED 
lights. I was lucky to win a 4-LED Black Diamond headlamp -- what a 
nice surprise :-) 

As for drop bags, though you can leave bags at any of the 15 aid 
stations at The Bear, I simplified things and only created 3. Only one 
is significant, the one which contains all of my warm clothes for when 
the sun goes down and it gets cold, which I decide to leave at the 
Paris Canyon aid station at 50 miles. For switching back in the 
morning, I simply place my name and number on a plastic bag that I 
carry in my Camelbak, so that wherever I am when it warms up in the 
morning, I can strip off the warm layers and drop them in the bag. 
Reading over the names of the aid stations, you would think that you 
were about to take a run through Europe: Danish Pass (twice), Paris 
Canyon (twice), Danish Flat, Copenhagen Basin Rd., Copenhagen Basin, 
German Dugway, and Finish (;-)! 

Wanting a good night's sleep, I didn't stick around long after the 
briefing, but returned to Logan to check into the Best Western, get a 
good meal, and get to bed. For dinner, I was directed to a nice Italian 
Restaurant, Gia's, where I was surprised to find Rob Byrne and his 
crew/pacer Larry England from Oakland, and Jan Gnass of Colorado, who 
were just finishing. Later, as I was leaving, Wasatch Fred (Fred 
Reimer), who captained the Paris Canyon aid station, came in. 

Unfortunately, I didn't sleep well, tossing and turning most of the 
night, with the longest period of sleep barely being over an hour. I 
was up at 3:30 am, and showered and out the door by 4:15, for the 45 
minute drive up to the start, at the Deer Creek Inn, just south of 
Preston , Idaho. The race doesn't start until 6:00 am, but because I 
hadn't been there before I gave myself more than enough time. I ended 
up arriving first, at 5:00 am and couldn't figure out where to go since 
everything was dark. Fortunately, Julie Nelson arrived shortly after me 
and knew where to go. 

Pleasantly, it wasn't cold at the start and I debated on whether to 
start with or without wearing my Western States 100 (WS100) tyvek 
jacket. I ended up starting with it, and though a bit warm at times, 
kept it on throughout the run, just rolling up the sleeves and opening 
up the front whenever it got too warm. By 6:00am, the 42 runners were 
gathered and Leland started us right on time. We followed a dark road 
for about a mile across a cattle guard and on to the trail head. I felt 
surprisingly good from the start and started to move up through the 
runners. Once on the trail, we started to climb and I lead a train of 7 
other runners up and past another 6 runners to where the course started 
to level off and we encountered several small meadows spotted with 
colorful maples. The trail was difficult to follow through the meadows, 
as there was no defined trail and we had to find the red or yellow 
ribbons that had been tied to clumps of grass on the ground. About an 
hour into the run, I caught up with Errol "Rocket" Jones, a first for 
me, and I told him he must be slowing down because his worse dream had 
just caught up to him. I should have never said that, because without 
looking around, he picked up the pace and I began to slow down. Now, as 
the daylight enabled us to turn off our lights, I lead the pack into a 
large meadow, where I lost the trail and the runners behind me fanned 
out trying to find it. When someone did find it, I was far off course 
to the right and a half dozen runners moved in front of me :( Shortly 
after that, I cut my hand climbing through a barbed-wire fence and then 
while running with Brett Sublett of Colorado and talking about trying 
not to fall after a couple of close calls tripping over rocks, I had my 
first and surprisingly only fall of the run. I smacked the ground quick 
and hard, but fortunately missed all of the rocks and didn't break or 
cut anything. 

The course meandered through more meadows and maples until at last we 
crossed Maple Creek. At this point we T'ed into a woodland road through 
the maples with trail ribbons going to both the left and right! 
Remembering our pre-race directions, we followed the road to the right 
for a half mile to the first aid station (Maple Creek) at 9 miles. I 
arrived 11th just under 2 hours. After a quick fill, I headed back up 
the road passing other runners as they were coming in. This is one of 
the two out-and-backs on the course, giving me a chance to snap some 
photos of the other runners. At this point the road through the woods 
transformed into a trail along and back and forth across the creek. It 
was absolutely beautiful with most of the trees in full autumn colors 
of red, yellow, and orange along the cascading creek. You get to enjoy 
this for a couple of miles before starting the long climb of about 2700 
ft. up a single-track eroded, rock strewn trail to the first crest. 

It was a big relief getting over that crest, knowing that the biggest 
single climb in the course was behind me and then having a relatively 
easy run downhill to the next aid station at Franklin Basin (16.4 
miles). From there, I had an easy run along dirt roads to the 3rd aid 
station at Danish Pass (20 miles in 5 hrs 7 min.), where I exchanged 2 
flasks of HammerGel in my drop bag. From Danish Pass, we had a 19 mile 
counterclockwise loop to the South and back to Danish Pass. This loop 
started with a climb on single-track trail to the highest point in the 
course at 9,119 ft. before dropping 1300 ft. to the Beaver Creek aid 
station (28 miles). The course from Beaver Creek, through the Fish 
Haven aid station (32 miles), back to Danish Pass was all on easy to 
run sandy dirt roads through meadows bordered by many groves of golden 
aspens. As easy as the running should have been, I had been having 
trouble eating anything and was running low on energy through this 
loop, falling back to 26th by the time I reached Danish Pass again 
(38.4 miles; 10 hrs. 15 min). I have to admit, during this period, I 
was having a debate with a voice telling me how nice it would be to 
just drop out at the next aid station, curl up and sleep, but 
fortunately, there was a much louder voice telling me there was nothing 
wrong with me, no aches or pains, only lack of energy and reminding me 
how much I wanted to complete this run. 

Leaving Danish Pass for the second time, the course returned to single-
track trail and climbed up to a trail which followed the ridge line of 
the mountains, much like the first first half of the Wasatch Front 100 
course. On the way up, I got to a point where I had gone for seemingly 
a very long period without seeing any course ribbons, until finally I 
reached the decision to backtrack to see if I had missed a turn. On my 
return, I met up with Scott Sullivan, who convinced me that I hadn't 
missed a turn and to press on along my original course. Thankfully, 
this was the correct move as we started to encounter more course 
ribbons again. Scott and I ran in sight of one another along the ridge 
line for most of the next 10 miles, with a bit of leap-frogging. At 
mile 44, we split off to the right of the main trail and dropped down a 
steep 1/2 mile of switchbacks to the Bloomington Canyon aid station. As 
we climbed back up to the main trail we passed several other runners 
just starting down and I was thinking how happy I was to have already 
done that. 

It was dark by the time I arrived at the Paris Canyon aid station (50 
miles) at 8:06 pm and it was fortunate that I carried both my 3-LED 
waste belt and my Princeton halogen flashlight. For me, the LED light 
works fine when I'm walking up hills or running along a dirt road, but 
when I'm running single-track, especially down hills, I need the added 
illumination the halogen light provides to see well enough not to fall. 
At Paris Canyon, it was good to see a familiar face, Fred Reimer. I 
spent 20 minutes here, eating noodle soup and adding a layer of warm 
clothing from my drop bag to prepare for a chilly night. Fortunately, 
it didn't seem like it was going to get terribly cold so I left most of 
my warmer options in my bag. At Paris Canyon, I also caught up with 
Scott Sullivan again, who was joined there by his crew and pacer for 
the rest of the run, Elena, reversing their roles from the Cascade 
Crest Classic 100 (CCC100), a month earlier. 

Once back on the trail, I was thinking optimistically, that if I could 
do the last half as fast as the first half, I would finish under 29 
hours :-) This didn't seem unreasonable at the time considering my 
hardest climb was behind me and most of the last 10 miles was down 
hill. The course to the next aid station, Dry Basin at 66 miles, was 
mostly on single-track through forest with a lot of up and down, but 
nothing significant. It was dark and I focused on my footing and 
staying on course. Jim and Louise Wholey, who had also run the CCC100 
with me a month earlier, caught up to me just as I arrived at Dry 
Basin. We got to exchange wishes of support at each of the next 2 aid 
stations, before I started picking up steam and moved forward. 

Dry Basin turned out to be a misnomer, as the course out of Dry Basin 
follows a dirt road that is flooded in many places, forcing me to try 
to skirt the edge without slipping in the mud. On one such passing, an 
overhanging branch knocked my hat off and into the muddy water. 
Fortunately, it landed in the water top-down and I was able to grab and 
shake it before it absorbed much water. It did remain quite mud-
encrusted for the rest of the run, as I learned at the end when I took 
it off. Also in this stretch, another branch ripped the left shoulder 
out of my WS100 jacket, which I was able to cinch up with some of the 
spare safety pins I always carry on one of my Camelbak straps, but it 
was definitely a throwaway at the end. After almost 2 miles of the dirt 
road, the course took an acute turn up to the left and for a short 
climb to Green Pass followed by a long gentle downhill of about 4 miles 
along a single track trail through meadows with lots of boulders. 
Finally, I reached a quiet paved road, which I followed to the left for 
1 1/2 miles over a ridge and down to the Danish Flat aid station (65 
miles; 2:15 am). I tried unsuccessfully to eat something here before 
moving on :( It was also at this point that I unknowingly passed Errol 
Jones, who had stopped here for an all too long nap! My own lack of 
sleep got to me twice during the night, around 10:30 pm and again at 
2:30 am, when I would feel very drowsy and start stumbling along. 
Fortunately, each time I was able to counter it within a few minutes 
with a NoDoz tablet. 

I caught up with Julie Nelson, of Layton, Utah at Danish Flat, where 
she took a break to warm up by the fire. Before moving on ahead of me 
she was able to give me a good description of what laid ahead for me, 
as she had trained over this section of the course. She told me to 
follow the dirt road out of Danish Flat a little over 2 miles to 
Liberty Creek and that after crossing the creek, I would have to endure 
several steep climbs and descents on single track trail. She was right 
on with her description and they were steep! After a few miles of this, 
I reached a paved road, which I followed to the left for 1/2 mile past 
the Emigration Campground to another trail, which was to lead us into 
the campground and to the next aid station. It was here that I got lost 
and wasted 17 minutes going around the campground looking for the aid 
station. I wasn't alone, as I encountered several other runners, 
including Scott and Elena, who were just as frustrated looking for the 
aid station. Finally, we all decided to follow a dirt road, which 
seemed counter to our written instructions, but which did lead us to 
the aid station -- whew! Knowing that I wouldn't be able to eat and 
upset about wasting time, I went right through this aid station passing 
many runners who had stopped to eat and get warm around the camp fire. 

From there, I continued to go south on Copenhagen Basin Road 4 miles, 
with a climb of 900 ft., to the Copenhagen Basin aid station (78 miles; 
7:25 am). It started to get light as I approached the aid station. I 
refilled my CamelBak bladder and headed back out through the meadow of 
the basin in the early morning light. It was very pleasant and I was 
happy:-) The next 4 miles back to the Dry Basin aid station (82 miles; 
8:51 am) was very easy over a combination of dirt jeep roads and trails 
through meadows and open woodland with no significant hills. 

At Dry Basin, I pulled out my portable drop bag with my name and number 
on it, in which I placed my long pants and warm top, which were too 
much now that the sun was starting to come out. I was also able to 
deposit my flashlights, LED belt, extra batteries, etc., as I wouldn't 
be needing them any more :) I also grabbed some food, which I was able 
to get down as I left the aid station, but not before making some 
horrific sounds, as I'm unfortunately getting to be known for, which I 
was told latter startled some of the ladies helping out at the station. 

Now, traveling lighter, and with some food in my stomach, I started to 
pick up my pace and run rather well. The next 8 miles to Paris Canyon 
was the same single-track cow trail I had run the previous night, but 
now in daylight and in the opposite direction, it was all new to me. 
Within a few miles, I caught up to and passed Scott and Elena and was 
able to run hard and fast on the down hills making good time. It was 
along this stretch that I encountered the only steers I saw along the 
course, which ran along in front of me for a few miles before figuring 
out how to step off the trail and let me pass. I'm sure their rancher 
wasn't too pleased with me that day as they probably lost more weight 
than they gained! 

Wasatch Fred greeted me again at Paris Canyon (90 miles; 8:58 am), 
where I made a quick water stop before heading down the easiest part of 
the course, a 3 mile sandy dirt road, all down hill to the German 
Dugway aid station, just before the hardest part of the course, 
Leland's Edge (aka Revenge)! While running hard down this stretch, my 
eye suddenly caught sight of a small snake stretched out in the soft 
sandy dirt. I stopped and on closer examination, I immediately 
recognized it as a rubber boa, one of only 2 boa species that live 
north of Mexico. It was a medium brown and only the size of a standard 
pencil. When I picked it up to move it safely off to the side, it 
coiled up around my finger. Moving on downhill, I next encountered a 
group of 6 geriatric ATV riders, which I had encountered along the road 
to Danish Pass 50 miles ago! They recognized me from behind their 
bandanas and again stopped to let the dust settle as I passed, just as 
they had thoughtfully done before. 

I passed right through German Dugway (93 miles; 12:10 pm), without 
refilling, which was almost a mistake as the next stretch was far 
harder than I imagined and I almost ran out of water! In my rush to get 
on to the finish, I missed the turn onto Leland's Ledge as soon as I 
left the aid station as I started down a dirt road. Fortunately, one of 
the aid station volunteers immediately notified me of my error and 
showed me the non-intuitous way right into the brush! Leland's Ledge is 
hard to describe, it has to be experienced to be appreciated, but I 
will try. Apparently, Leland, in laying out the course encountered the 
problem of having to get the runners across a section of steep canyon 
without any trails to a cow trail, which would lead the runners on to 
the finish. His solution was to have the runners climb 1 1/2 miles 
through all of the scrub maples and rocks midway around the canyon 
walls. The course is so irregular that he had to tie ribbons every 
couple of feet to lead the runners over, under, around, and behind 
whatever obstacles they encountered. There is no way to run any of 
this; you just keep moving as fast as you can without sliding down the 
steep slopes. It seemed like it would never end and took me about 75 
minutes to reach the heavily eroded, rock strewn cow path that I was 
able to run, more like dance, for the next 4 miles before finally 
reaching the road. Just as I started onto Leland's Ledge, I was caught 
and passed by James Miller and his pacer, who amazed me with how fast 
they were able to move though it. I was very pleased with how fast I 
covered this section, but in only 7 miles, James did it 45 minutes 
faster! At the road, I caught and passed Elizabeth Bouquet and her 
pacer and then ran non-stop down the last mile along the road we 
started on to the finish at Deer Creek Inn. I finished 22 of 42 
starters, in a time of 32 hours 35 minutes and 28 seconds:-) This 
placed me 37th on the all-time finishers list, at least until next 
year. 

Conveniently, my car was parked right at the finish line and I was able 
to shower and change at a restroom, outside the restaurant nearby. Then 
I returned to the finish line to cheer in the remaining runners. I was 
totally stunned to learn that Rocket Jones hadn't finished yet, as I 
knew he was much faster than me and I never recalled passing him. He 
was one of only 4 who was going for his 4th consecutive finish and I 
knew he wanted to continue this streak. It was a real heartbreak to all 
of us as the 35 hour time limit passed and then Errol appeared coming 
down the road shortly after missing the cutoff by less than 2 minutes, 
due to napping too long :( 

In our race packets we all received gift certificates for $20 for 
dinner at the Deer Creek Inn for our post race dinner and awards 
ceremony. For this, we gathered around 6 PM out on the back porch of 
the restaurant, ordered from a super menu including trout, supposedly 
from Leland's farm, along with many other excellent selections. While 
we ate, Leland presented the awards. Hal Koerner III, of Colorado, 
continued not only his streak of finishing all 4 Bear 100 runs, but of 
winning all 4, resetting his record each time! With a very heavy race 
schedule, he wasn't expected to even make it this year, but pleasantly 
surprised everyone when he showed up at the pre-race meeting. His new 
record time of 21:00:17, was the only time under 24 hours and thus the 
sole winner of the coveted Wolverine Club buckle. Mary Workman was the 
first place woman with a time of 29:40:50 and also maintained her 4 
time finishing streak as did Tim Seminoff. Leland has promised a 
special award for anyone who finishes 5 consecutive Bear 100s, 
something to look forward to next year. Leland awarded Grizzly Bear 
Club buckles to the 13 runners who finished over 24 hours and under 30 
hours and Black Bear Club buckles to the 18 finishers between 30 and 35 
hours. All 3 of the buckles are very nice looking -- my favorites of 
all of the running buckles I have seen! In addition to a buckle, all 
finishers within the 35 hour limit, were also awarded a 12"x9" etched 
brass plaque on a blue and black background with the run logo and 
course profile along with the runner's name, place, and time, all 
mounted on a polished hardwood base. In conclusion, The Bear 100, 
thanks to all of the careful and thoughtful planning, volunteers, and 
dedication is a first class event!

Many Thanks,

Chuck 

Subject: The Bear 100 -- Endurance Trail of Color
From: "Wilson, Chuck"
Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 20:02:29 –0700