Jan 06th – Day 51 at Pole

Whew, it’s been a busy few weeks. We had New Years festivities here which were fun, as well as lots of work finishing up summer maintenance tasks on the telescope. We’re now getting ready to hold the 2022 South Pole Marathon (this Sunday, Jan 9th). Myself and one of the SPT winterovers have been busy designing and making the finishers medals. I will post pictures once we’ve completed them!

This year I am planning something slightly different from the normal marathon – a 24 hour endurance run! I am going to begin at 12am Sunday Jan 9th and go until 12am Monday Jan 10th (NZ time, of course). You will likely be able to watch me at the beginning (SPTR is up at various times between midnight and 6am here) as well as in the evening (4pm-9pm my time) on the live feed cameras — https://www.usap.gov/videoclipsandmaps/spwebcam.cfm

I will also be joining in on the marathon, which starts at 0930, so I’ll have been running for 9.5 hours already at that point (hopefully around 40 miles or so). It will be a nice mid-run boost being with other people and having the energy of the marathon. This year’s course is pretty nice, and consists of four 6.55 mile loops. I think I will start out on the course loop (depending on the condition of the course), and might end up running back and forth between SPT and the station since the foot path is nicely packed down. I’ve got a bunch of snacks and extra clothes/jackets/balaclavas/ etc out at SPT , so I’m using that as my warmup shack/aid station with fans for drying clothes and a heatgun for melting ice! It’s about 1km from the station to SPT so it’s a nice way to keep track of my progress and it’s easy to duck out of the cold if needed.

I’ve tested my GPS watch by running one loop of the course (which was measured precisely by the South Pole Surveyor to be 6.55 miles) and I measured 6.57miles – so bang on!

Here’s my flyer for the run … edited from the marathon flyer. Oddly, I don’t think anyone else is participating.

Will post pictures and/or videos later once I get things set up and run. I’m excited! The weather has been super nice the past few days, and I’m all giddy to go. I hope it holds out until Monday!! Fingers crossed.

I’m also helping out with a lot of the logistics for the Marathon, so I need to get back to that! Snacks and beverages won’t provide themselves! And also prep for my day.. Saturday I will be busy preparing ; making lots of ramen packets, and coffee and gatorade and schlepping it all out to my aid station at SPT.

I should also mention that most of what I am doing is not condoned by station management or medical … because of course, why would it be?