Skurka and Zahab cover crazy miles

Andrew Skurka hiked 4,679 miles in 176 days. Averaging over 26 miles-a-day isn't something new to Skurka, but this trip brought him through rough territory, where he was often following game trails or contour lines, or postholing.

"Nobody had ever done it before: Hike, ski, and raft 4,679 miles through eight national parks, dozens of mountain ranges, and the length ofthe Yukon territory," Dan Koeppel wrote in his article for the March issue of National Geographic Magazine. "Then along came Andrew Skurka."

I was thinking that six months is a long time to spend by yourself but, at the speed he hikes, Skurka is probably used to hiking alone.

The National Geographic story has some great photos in it, so does his Web site.

During the trip, Skurka was brought to tears by the realization that he's just a creature as small and bound by the will of nature as the caribou whose path he followed. I would be much more inclined to cry at the notion of postholing, or running 60 km a day in the dessert with a blister.

Read ExWeb's Q & A with Zahab

Ray Zahab ran 20 days at 60 km (37.28 miles), wearing a 12 kg (26.45 lb) backpack, in the heat of the Atacama desert. Talk about thirsty. 


His foot was so swollen he had to cut his shoe open, but he kept running. He thought, "you have 2 choices, keep going or stop. I chose to keep going, and on the second day after the blister I managed 70 km." A more rational thought would have been, "What is the number of a good taxi?"


I wonder if I can get these two guys to join my adventure racing team.