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Greensboro runner Charlie Engle, the new Death Valley Cup record-holder for the best combined time in the Badwater Ultramarathon (135-mile foot race) and Furnace Creek 508 (508-mile bicycle race), checked in this week.

Engle on:

THE CHALLENGE: “I thought to myself, ‘I’m a runner, what am I doing on this bike?’ Seriously, it was, for me, beyond difficult. It was harder than Badwater has ever been for me. I think part of it is I was not as comfortable on the bike as I am on my feet. But the race director even said that in 30 years, these were the worst conditions in the history of the race.”

RACE CONDITIONS: “It was all wind-related. The biggest enemy on a bike is a headwind. I rode the first 250 miles with an average of over 21 mph. Then my average slowed to about 9 mph for the next 150. It was really 12 hours of riding directly into a 40 mph wind. It’s as demoralized as I’ve ever been in the middle of a race. It’s so frustrating to fight that hard and feel like you’re just simply getting nowhere. …

“Even now, they’re in a pattern out there, with 40 mph straight-line winds with gusts up to 70 mph. Seriously, I almost got my entire bike and person blown off the course a handful of times. A couple of people did actually get blown off the road.”

THE RECORD: “I was hovering between fourth and seventh place during all that time. My placing was very good. My main concern during this year’s race was the record for the Death Valley Cup. So I tried to not get too caught up in the racing, and I was really racing the clock. I will say, there was a time at about 320 miles into that race that I sorta gave up on the record because I felt like that at the pace I was going it was going to be very unlikely I was going to set this record. …

“I definitely brought it down significantly. It is what drove me in this bike race. The race itself was so difficult. Had it not been for the chase of the Death Valley Cup, I would’ve finished the race; I never quit. But I would’ve eased up a bit and not made it so darned hard on myself. Riding a couple of hours slower would’ve made my life easier. Just like with Badwater, I had a stellar crew out there motivating me. And I’m very happy to say there were thousands and thousands of hits online, so I knew a whole lot of people out there were watching and pulling for me. While there’s pressure on one hand, it’s also very motivating.

“I am a very stubborn athlete. But by no means a physically gifted one. I like to remind people, it is about going after things that other people say are impossible.

“I sure don’t want to have to go after it again. I hope I get (to hold the record) 10 years, also.”

(Above: A bit of on-course entertainment provides a lighter moment as Engle begins a 13-mile-long, 3,800-foot climb).

THE TERRAIN: “It’s very mountainous out there. You go across several big mountain ranges. The climb is more than 35,000 feet. For me again, what’s interesting is some of the mountains were incredibly long climbs. There’s one that was a 20-mile climb. One would think when you get to top, it’s a great relief and you go down. Yes, it was, and it’s lot of fun to go down. But I hit nearly 60 mph downhill on a handful of occasions. To tell the truth, that’s a little scary.”

CREW AND NUTRITION: “It’s just like Badwater, I had a crew out there with me. I had four people that were crazy enough to come out and ride in a truck for 33 hours and make sure that I didn’t die. Nutrition, honestly, in these events, anything over about five hours becomes a very tactical race. Those tactics are really around hydration and nutrition. Everyone has experience when they get really hot and really tired, strangely, they don’t feel hungry. So it’s very common to stop eating. My crew’s job while I was out there is to essentially force me to eat and drink whether I want to or not. We calculate out the calories very thoroughly beforehand. They expect me to eat and drink, basically consume, about 400 calories per hour. So I definitely consumed close to 15,000 calories over 33 hours. But I probably burned twice that.

“I started at 174 (pounds) and finished at 167. Honestly, today is Tuesday, so the race ended over 48 hours ago. And I am still dehydrated. I’m on it, I’m drinking, but the body can only absorb so much. It’s not like you can just drink four gallons of water and you’re back to normal. …

“I use a drink called Infinit, out of Ohio. It’s a small company, and it makes products specifically for every athlete. I spent an hour on the phone with the president of the company talking about my calorie needs. He designed a formula specifically for me that was electrolytes, carbs and proteins. That was the big difference. The hard part is most sports drinks don’t contain protein and also contain high-fructose corn syrup. It’s one thing to have an over-the-counter sports drink after you’ve played tennis or run a 10K, but if you’re trying to do something much longer than that, having something that’s more nutrition-balanced is important.

“And I used a very, very secret mixture of peanut butter and honey sandwiches. I probably ate peanut butter and honey or peanut butter and jelly every two hours. It’s just what I learned through the years is very easy on my stomach. …

“Another big factor out there is I worked so hard in the wind that I got an incredible case of the sleepies. I’m not kidding, for 10 hours on a bike, I was fighting sleep. It’s just like driving in a car, when you have that terrible feeling, but there’s no window to stick your head out of. In my normal life I never drink soda, I’m a vegetetarian, I’m pretty pretty healthy, and I don’t drink a lot of soda. But out there anything goes. Anything calorie-wise to stay awake. So I had a couple of Red Bulls, a couple of Cokes, couple of root beers.

“A couple of times the crew had to ride behind me. There was no leapfrogging at night for safety reasons. Lights on, it was very safe. A couple of times they honked at me because they could tell I was nodding off. One time when I got very frustrated, I was cold, I was about 320 miles or so into the race, I got off the bike and got into the front seat of the support vehicle and I just sat there about five minutes. I said, ‘You just gotta let me close my eyes for five minutes.’ To their credit, that was all they gave me. The five minutes was up, they opened the door and dragged me out of the car and put me back on the bike. I was slightly belligerent. I wanted to sleep. Before these races, the same thing with Badwater, we have a team meeting. I say, no matter what, you keep me on that bike. You do no let me take any kind of extended break no matter what I say to you.”

CARING FOR HIS BODY: “I did this race two years ago, and I did learn some valuable lessons about taking care of my hands, my feet and most importantly my rear end. Let me just say, 33 hours of sitting on a bike seat can be tremendously uncomfortable if you don’t have the right equipment. My hands, I did all my training without gloves, which sounds counterintuitive, but it really toughened up my hands. During the race, I did not wear gloves for the first half, but when my hands got sore, I put the gloves on and felt much better.

“I wore Balegas (socks). I wore them for the Badwater and Furnace Creek. It sounds stange to think you’d have a problem with your feet on a bike, but the roads for Furnace Creek are very rough. You’re not on smooth highways. At times it looks like you’re in a Third World country. My feet actually got blisted two years ago, on a bike.

“I actually switched from wearing regular cycling shorts to bibs. They look almost like suspenders. There’s pressure pulling up, so it keeps everything in place. One of my companies, Mission Skincare, has anti-friction cream. I used at Badwater, used it here, and it’s exactly what it sounds like. Friction points are incredibly crucial on a bike. So I used an abundant amount of Mission and Mission SPF. When you’re out there this time of year, it’s not 125 degrees, but the sun sure does shine brightly.”

WHAT’S NEXT? Engle will run the H.U.R.T. 100 Trail Race in January in Hawaii. But first: He left for Hartford, Conn., today to run the ING Hartford Marathon on Saturday. He’ll run the IMT Des Moines Marathon on Oct. 18. Then comes a weekend double: The Ridge to Bridge Marathon in Morganton on Oct. 24 and the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington on Oct. 25.