This is not just a race; it is an unforgettable event! The best part of the season with a beautiful location, music, and a hot meal. The Blue Ridge Ultra is a 50K loop trail race is deep within the beautiful Chattahoochee National Forest of the North Georgia Mountains. It …
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This is not just a race; it is an unforgettable event! The best part of the season with a beautiful location, music, and a hot meal.
The Blue Ridge Ultra is a 50K loop trail race is deep within the beautiful Chattahoochee National Forest of the North Georgia Mountains. It consists of 16 miles of the Benton MacKaye trail, 6 miles of Hidden trails and 9 miles of Forest Service roads. You will experience tough, and sometimes technical spots, single track trails, jumping over logs, creek crossings, steep ascents and even steeper descents all while enjoying the leaves changing colors. Start and Finish at the historic Shallowford iron bridge spanning the Toccoa River. This race will challenge the most experienced racer and provide a memorable experience for those looking to complete a trail run in the mountains of Blue Ridge.
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Hard course, great location
My Garmin is often short by a mile or two on 30k runs, but it measured this one as 16.93 miles. I'm guessing it is probably closer to 19+ but … MORE
My Garmin is often short by a mile or two on 30k runs, but it measured this one as 16.93 miles. I’m guessing it is probably closer to 19+ but maybe not 20? Not sure and I don’t mind some distance variation in the races I run because I’m not a competitive runner and am just fine going a bit shorter or longer than the advertised distance, but for purists you may want to confirm before registering for this one.
The start line is promising. It’s a super pretty area. There isn’t much parking and it seems like basically everyone just parks in the grass along the side of the road. There is a cool country store across from the iron bridge where you start and finish. And that’s also where you get your post race meal. I didn’t stay for the post-race meal because you order from a menu and the line was crazy long with other runners ordering and waiting. It was just a small country store the looks like the restaurant was an afterthought. So it’s not like they have a lot of help back there. I’m sure the food was good but maybe they need to get rid of the menu and just make a standard array of foods and put them on tables for the runners after the race. It’s a small store with not a lot of room for a line. That’s really not a negative at all; just a suggestion. The store was super cute and I’d like to go back and drive through there, and eat at the store, during the week when it’s not so crowded.
Would I recommend this race? Maybe. It was hard, steep and more technical than I like, but I’m an average runner who finishes in the middle of the pack. Out of 102 people who started the race I finished 59th. So if you are in that range of finishers in the races you run you may also think this is a steep and technical race. And there was no great payoff during the race. No incredible views, nothing to redeem itself from the technical work. It’s a pretty course at times, just not spectacular.
I’m glad I ran this one but probably wouldn’t run it again. But I can see the attraction of driving to such a pretty place, camping for the weekend, eating at the Iron Bridge store and cafe, and doing the run.