March 1, 2019

Sign Up Day for 2019 GYAS Races!

Your Races Are Open

It's time.

At high noon today (March 1, 2019), the Greater YellowstoneAdventure Series races for the 2019 race season are open for signup.  It's time to book a race on your calendar. Then, it's time to book a lifetime trip to our nation's first National Park.  

Yellowstone National Park was established on March 1, 1872 by President Ulysses Grant. However, it was President Teddy Roosevelt who was the true Yellowstone champion and the champion for America's public lands.  He put up this gate near Gardiner with the immortal words

FOR THE BENEFIT AND ENJOYMENT OF THE PEOPLE

Yellowstone is. It's there for the benefit and enjoyment of anyone and everyone.  It's yours, it's ours, and it's for the world to share. So, too, are the GYAS races.  Our races are run on public land.  We are right next door to the most amazing piece of public land in the world (Yellowstone), but it's all wonderful.  We want you to come and run, cycle, or swim on Montana's public lands and then visit Yellowstone, fly fish our rivers, hike our trails, camp in our backcountry and national forest sites, and simply breathe in the beauty of Montana.

We are doing our best to make it easy for you.  Currently, the running clubs that have discounts for the GYAS races include: Marathon Maniacs, Half Marathon Maniacs, 50 State Club, 100 Half Marathons Club, John Colter Club (sign up for this year!), Big Sky Wind Drinkers, and Run Wild Missoula.  There are more to come.  Contact your club for the discount code.

It's been a tough winter for many (check out the photo below), but Spring really is just around the corner.  It's time for rebirth and renewal.  We get a do-over.  Make it count in 2019.  Come to Montana.  Earn the most beautiful PW you'll ever earn by running the Madison.  Run amid billions (with a 'b') of wildflowers.  High five angels on the highest road marathon in the world.  Cycle 40 miles straight up.

We're here.  Your races are open.  The links below go live at 12:01 PM today.

Stay Happy, Healthy, and Always Keep Running Forward and don't stop until you get to Ennis Montana, the HQ of the GreaterYellowstone Adventure Series.

Sam

Water to Whiskey 5K

24th Annual Madison River Run

June 1, 2019 

The Madison River is currently in 'full gorge.'  This means the river freezes from the bottom of the river channel up which pushes the water that doesn't freeze outside the river channel.  This causes a huge pain in the frozen ass for many because of flooding. It also makes it hard to fly fish on the Madison since the fish can't quite reach (or see) the fly.  The Madison River Run starts right on top of the river halfway across the bridge on Highway 287.  All the snow and ice on the river now should melt by June or maybe July......this is Montana after all.

The Water to Whiskey 5K (a.k.a. the 24th Annual Madison River Run) is probably the only 5K in the world that starts on top of a blue ribbon fly fishing river, has a route that takes you to a church built in 1902, and finishes in front of a small batch distillery that makes world class spirits for world class individuals (i.e. all of us).  Start on the water - go to church - finish at the whiskey.  Yep, a life well lived can be found in Southwest Montana.  

Your post-race lunch host is at Willies Distillery, a.k.a. Montana's Best Idea.  The Willies team will host a free BBQ for all after the 5K.  This is an annual family friendly event with food, games, music, and more.  You don't have to run the 5K to attend, but doing so makes the roasted pig, fixings, and specialized drinks go down better.

Can you think of a better way to kick off summer?   Sign up today!
 

The New Everest.

Last year more than 700 people summited Mount Everest.  Talk about ho hum!  None of them have ever completed the Madison Trifecta, but I believe at least one of the TBAs who has completed the Trifecta has trekked to Everest Base Camp.

The Madison Trifecta is Montana's supreme challenge.  It's the Madison Duathlon followed by the Madison Marathon followed by the Madison Triathlon all within four weeks of summer.  All at high elevations.  All with enormous uphills.  Do this, and you'll be forever knows as a Total Bad Ass (TBA).

Wanna change your life as you know it?  Take this on for the summer of 2019.  Sign up today!

8th Annual Madison Duathlon

July 6, 2019 

This is a point to point duathlon (14 mile bike and seven mile run) that cuts straight through a mountain range separating Ennis and Virginia City.  You start on the banks of the world famous Madison River and finish in front of the oldest operating courthouse in Montana.  That's why we call this the Gold Miner's Trail.

It's also the first leg of the Madison Trifecta and your journey to becoming a TBA.  Break bread with us after the race at a free BBQ for all participants and their friends and family. Then, explore one of the nation's best preserved Gold Rush Era towns. 

Sign up today! 

The Ultras

Proposed for July 7, 2019

No Link Yet!  No race yet. Please be patient.  I'm doing everything I can to make this happen.  Save the date!  

It will be 50K up and 50K down.  You choose.  We're working on a combined time category for teams (e.g. two friends do the Ultras, one goes up, one goes down, and the lowest combined times is the winner).

Stay tuned.  Please!

Cool logos, no?

Double Marathoners in Montana do it at 9,000 feet

July 20 and 21

Last year's marathon trophies and race medal.  For this year, the trophy will be the same - some fantastic Willies Distillery Bourbon - and the race medal will feature a different Yellowstone critter.

This is Montana's only double marathon (at least by a series).  It is likely the only double marathon in the world at such a high elevation and definitely the only one where you can see, on a clear day, 100 miles in any direction. 

Marathon Maniacs can earn four stars by doing this double.  Even better, this double weekend is close to the Deseret News Marathon in Salt Lake City and the Idaho Falls Marathon in nearby Idaho. So, Maniacs can earn five stars by knocking out three marathons in three states in less than 10 days.  How cool is that?

The real question is this: Why do just one marathon when you can do two and have twice as much fun?
 

Sign up today!

12th Annual Madison Marathon

July 20, 2019
 

Here's a bold bet on the Madison Marathon.  No matter how many marathoners you ask - 11 years' worth of runners who have done the Madison - I bet that every one of them, all of them, will place the Madison Marathon in their Top Five favorite or toughest marathons of all time.  No matter how many marathons they have completed.  The Madison will be a Top Five.  We have several runners who have completed more than 1,000 marathons.  Tons and tons who have done more than 100, but I would still make this bet.

Why? 

You gotta come and see.  It's the elevation (9,000 feet on average), the view shed (you can see for 100 miles on clear days), the wildlife (all kinds along the route), the huge uphills (and downhills), the wildflowers (gazillions and gazillions), and you get the chance to high five angels because you really are that close to heaven.  It's also the highly probable outcome that you will record a PW, but you also just won't care.  When you're running so close to heaven, no one cares about their time.  They care about their experience.  Come see for yourself.  It's the GYAS keystone race. 

Sign up today.  This race has sold out many times.  It's also the second leg of the Madison Trifecta.

5th Annual Big Sky Marathon

July 21, 2019

At this writing (March 1, 2019), there is at least 10 feet of snow on the Gravelly Range.  There's a couple feet on the valley bottom. The Madison River is gorged (photo above) and it's cold.  This means an incredible snow pack in the mountains.  And that often means a bumper crop of wild flowers in the spring.  A Montana bumper crop means billions and billions of wildflowers of so many varieties of wildflowers.  You'll feel like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music as you run along the Gravelly Range Road for either the Madison or the Big Sky Marathon.

For the Big Sky, you start on top and you head down to the river.  We're looking into a different route on the flats in order to avoid the highways.  More details on that soon as there may be construction on Varney Bridge Road. 

This is the second half of Montana's only double marathon.  It's a doozy.  You want to see mountain ranges 50 to 100 miles away.  Come do the Big Sky.  Life will just seem different after you do.

Sign up today.

8th Annual Madison Triathlon

August 3, 2019

We just might be the only Olympic Distance Triathlon in Montana.  I haven't found another one.  I know we're the only one that finishes in an ancient silver mining town with a world famous bar.  We're probably the only one in the country that does that and has a post-race party in a hundred year old house.

The Madison Tri is the final leg of the Madison Trifecta. It's a chance to compete and then share with the Total Bad Asses (TBAs) for 2019.  They are extraordinary individuals.  Come check it all out.  It's a great way to begin the final month of summer. 

Sign up today.

3rd Annual Tour de Gravelly

August 4, 2019

Part of the 40 miles of uphill

I couldn't resist showing you the Garmin results of last year's Master's Champion.  That's a lot of climbing!
 

We have enormously high hopes for the Tour de Gravelly. It's tough, challenging, incredibly beautiful, and like very few other cycling races anywhere.  In the space of less than 40 miles, you will gain 6,000 in elevation.  Then, you'll have a roller coaster of a downhill over 17 miles.  It's dizzying.  It's bizarre.  It's something that you simply have to do before you kick the bucket. 

For anyone who thinks they have cycled hills, come check out this hill.  You start in Ennis and then you simply go up and over the Gravelly Range.  That's it.  Quite simple really. Up and over.  There ain't no flat spots to speak of. 

This is a race you have to check out.  Sign up today and do so in August.

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