Son BABYBULB is running HELLBENDER100 @ Mt Mitch!

May 9, 2025, 10:06 AM

AGAIN for 3rd straight year..now age 55 but hopefully even wiser and better prepared & equipped!

Tiger grad Will crossed the Start line this Friday May 9th morning around 5am and has up to 40 hours to finish the 100 mile run by early Sat evening.

When finished I estimate he will have taken 300,000 dangerous & potentially crippling steps over rocks/ boulders & streams to my 2-day total of 13,000 steps walking on soft even grass or pavement!

Mt Mitchell is the tallest mountain range east of the Rockies and with its rugged, challenging & changing terrain, streams and severe temperature changes from morn to night, it’s a great challenge to any runner..

Even to one who after 25 years of participating in extremely arduous events such as in the Iron Man Competition and pushing a disabled vet in a wheel chair up & down mountain roads and events as far away as California..it’s a tough event of endurance and pacing oneself.

Saying, he’s a trooper but he’s also 55 now, been slowed by not only age but by having Covid several times, leg/knee/foot injuries, etc but he relishes the self competition, being around others who love the sport, being in an environment and outdoor challenge that gives him personal self-satisfaction and ability to excel and achieve irregardless of the finish position or time.

Will has run this HELLBENDER100 Miler in 2023 & 2024..and to show how difficult this event can be..he preps for it weeks & months beforehand by running on weekdays before breakfast, or before lunch and on weekends..and often driving 100+ miles round-trip to the site itself or to other nearby mountains to run and condition himself and increase his stamina.

Even with that, he finished dead last in 2023 and was 17 minutes from being disqualified after running almost 40 straight hours with no real rest, sleep or napping..and had became a bit delirious, vomited due to too much electrolytes and laid down on the path for a few minutes near the end until his pacer buddy got him up to finish..

with TigerNetters “bretfsu”, others and me yelling at our cell phone screens since we were tracking him as a dot and a number on the course and we could see he was 2 miles out but he had to hoof it to beat the 40 hour clock..

And when he crossed the finish line at dusk with only 17 minutes to spare, we TigerNetters all screamed for joy in unison via our posting while Dad was so proud of his Clemson grad Boy for gutting it out and having that TiGER spirit of excelling in him.

After finishing, the race committee surprised him by bestowing on him the exact same prizes and gifts as the 1st place finisher (who had probably finished 15-20 hours earlier) of a custom-carved wooden plaque with the Hellbender logo, a cap, T-shirt and best of all a metal belt buckle with the logo.

He was ecstatic and never happier with gutting it out to show himself and others that the tortoise does win even if the slower.

Last year he finished next to last and crossed the line with about 30 minutes to spare.

If interested in following Will, he is runner 282.

Go to: live.enabledtracking.com (HELLBENDER100).

Go TiGER(s)..Rock!