Forty-one-year-old ultrarunner Scott Jurek set out on Memorial Day in an attempt to break the supported speed record on the Appalachian Trail, . He is heading north on the trail聽and聽hopes to reach Maine鈥檚 Mount Katahdin in early July.
The record to beat: Jennifer Pharr Davis completed the A.T. in聽46 days, 11 hours, 20 minutes in 2011. She covered an average of聽47 miles per day and was supported by a team of three that included her husband, Blue Ridge Outdoors Magazine听谤别辫辞谤迟蝉.
Jurek has won a number of elite ultrarunning events聽and,聽in 2010, he set a new U.S. all-surface record in the 24-hour run with a distance of 165.7 miles. He was featured prominently聽in Christopher McDougall鈥檚 2009 bestselling book on distance running, Born to Run, in which he ran in the Copper Canyon Ultra race with native Mexican Tarahumara runners.*
*This story has been revised from the version first published on May 28, 2015, because it inadvertently used similar language to what was published in聽Blue Ridge聽Outdoors Magazine.听国产吃瓜黑料聽apologizes for the error and is investigating all previous work of the writer.