Runners Matt Shepard (left), Derek Yip (middle) and Keeley Milne (right) shortly after the completed their six day race at the Legion Track in Grande Prairie. Photo Credit: Shane Clausing

By Shane Clausing

RECORD BREAKING ATTEMPT

Valleyview man and friends complete six day running journey

Jul 7, 2020 | 3:14 PM

After six days of running through some very wet weather conditions, Valleyview resident Matt Shepard and his running partners Keeley Milne and Derek Yip completed their lengthy run on Tuesday morning at the Legion Track in Grande Prairie.

Shepard’s goal was to run over 870 kilometers in six days, which would’ve broken the current six day Canadian record that has stood since 1891.

In order to make the chase for the record official so they could get official timing and some other requirements, Shepard had to have some people run with him, so his friends Milne and Yip also participated in the six-day challenge with him, both trying to challenge themselves to set new goals and personal bests.

Shepard spoke about why he decided to chase the record.

“I like to do these ultra-endurance races. I did a six day (race) in Arizona back in December & January and I really fell in love with the format,” explained Shep. “I was like ‘I really need to give this another go’. I could see that I was definitely in range of the record.

Plan Ahead

Why Would You Pre-Plan Your Funeral?

Apr 03, 2024

Dying away from home

What Happens if You Die Away From Home?

Mar 04, 2024

Flag Retiring Ceremony

What Do You Do With Worn-Out Flags?

Feb 01, 2024

“We started looking for a venue and trying to organize, but with the current condition of the world it was quite a difficult task until we came to GP.”

Shepard added that the City of Grande Prairie was very helpful helping his crew get the permits they needed and securing the venue.

Their journey was also live streamed on Personal Peak’s Facebook page. Personal Peak also set up a 24-hour live stream on YouTube for those who wanted to watch.

All three runners began their journey at 9:00 a.m. on Canada Day, when inconveniently, the sky opened up and a record amount of rain fell during the day.

“It started off a little bit rough with lots and lots of rain, it flooded the track and then it got a little better from there,” explained Shepard.

The rain got so bad, according to Shepard, that the first three lanes on some parts of the track were filled with water. Luckly for the runners, other members of the running community helped clean off the track by bringing shovels and shoveling the water into the infield.

The runners continued to run despite the rain, and most of their running was done throughout the night, starting at around 3:00 a.m.

Around day four of Shepard’s run, injuries started to pop up. Shepard suffered a knee injury, which slowed his progress down to the point where he began to feel that beating the 870 kilometers record wasn’t going to happen. He says it was a tough challenge mentally.

“I really felt that I was going to be able to hit that goal on this one, so that was definitely a mental struggle to say, ‘Ok, you’re going to have scrub this goal and you won’t be able to get it on this attempt,’ and knowing that you still have two and a half days left in the race, that was a pretty big mental hurdle to get over.”

Shepard added that he tried to carry a positive mindset over the last two days of the run.

Shepard wasn’t the only one who had some injuries pop up. Yip ended up having to deal with a shin injury throughout most of the run, while Milne ended up dealing with a foot injury because of the wet track from all the rain that had fallen.

Despite the injuries and Shepard not getting the record, the runners took everything in stride and felt that it was a good learning experience.

“It was an incredible experience,” said Milne. “It was my first time running over 100 kilometres and first time doing a six-day format. I really learned a lot about ultras, and it was really fun to Matt and Derek.”

Yip is more of a trail/mountain runner but mentioned that the last six days was a good learning experience.

“My longest race that I completed to date was 170 kilometres around the Alpes in Europe. Running around a track isn’t exactly a very scenic route, but the nice thing about running around a track is you have all your supplies available very close, unlike many of these mountain races. It was a good opportunity to test out a number of things when it comes to nutrition and clothing choices through the conditions we endured.”

By the time the race had finished on Friday morning, Shepard ran a total of 551.2 kilometers, Milne ran 427.2 kilometers and Yip ran 322 kilometers.

Milne surpassed her previous personal best distance by over 300 kilometers.

Yip meanwhile surpassed his previous personal best and hit his goal of over 200 miles (300 kilometres)

The group says that they plan on doing more six-day races like this in the future.