Racing season is over for the year for me, unless one of my friends somehow convinces me otherwise. My last race was one I wasn’t really planning to run for sure. Once I decided to run the race I actually got pretty excited about it. The race was Last Rebel Survivor presented by Rebellion Running.

Last Rebel Survivor is a last person standing style event in the vein of Bigs Backyard Ultra. Everyone runs loops of the same course until only one person can continue. The spin on this event is that with each lap completed the time you have to complete the next lap decreases. The course was a 1 mile loop on local trails. The race begins with 20 minutes to complete a lap and decreases by 1 minute after each completed lap then after about 10 laps it decreases by 30 seconds for each lap that follows. Each person is eliminated when they either fail to complete a lap in the allotted time or fail to start the next lap.

The more I thought about this event the more I became intrigued about the strategy of how best to run this style of race so that one could last the longest possible. Is it best to go as slow as possible and even walk on the early laps so that you are exerting yourself as little as possible or is it better to run at a good pace and have plenty of time to rest between laps? What strategy will keep you freshest the longest so that you have energy to push yourself harder when the time to complete a lap gets shorter and shorter?

Race day ended up being pretty chilly and I opted for a slow paced run that allowed me to keep warm through exertion and get back to the start line with time to rest. The downside was that since I started off at a run I got sweaty early and got cold because I wasn’t exerting myself enough to stay warm or constantly to stay warm so unlike everyone else who was removing layers as the race went on I actually added a layer. I had no expectation that I would win the race, but I wanted to see how long I could last before I could no longer complete a lap in the designated time. I was really hoping to complete at least 10 laps which would be around 10 miles and would be my longest run by 4 miles since September 7. Unfortunately, things did not go my way. It seems the rocky terrain struck my foot just right to aggravate this tender spot I had near my heel and cause pain to spread along the outside edge of my left foot. The pain got worse as each lap went on and got to the point where I could barely push off my left foot and any side to side movement of my foot was quite painful. I was averaging around 12 minute miles until the last lap I completed where by the end I couldn’t really run at all. I called it a day and dropped after about 6 miles.

I didn’t want to chance causing a more serious injury. The whole plan for the last few months has been getting healthy and staying healthy, so the last thing I wanted to do was get hurt and derail all the work I have been doing. It was really frustrating to struggle due to an injury at this event. So much of my running this year has been a struggle. But I did manage to find some positive in the early exit.

I had been planning to document the event as I ran with my GoPro, which I did and I planned to photograph what remained of the event after my day of running ended with my DSLR. My early exit simply allowed me to spend more time doing something else that I truly love, photographing the running community I love. Although, it did hurt a bit to hobble around to get into position for photos I wanted to take. Maybe the early exit was a blessing in disguise because I really like the images I was able to capture. Who knows how much if any I would have been able to photograph if I had kept running even if I was healthy.

The good news is my injury seems to just be soft tissue strain of some type. It wasn’t swollen or bruised post race and did some icing and soaking and a few days later it feels much better. Still painful but definitely better.

The winner ended up running around 20 miles I believe, 19 laps completed. This was such a fun event to be a part of as both a runner and a spectator. I can’t wait to run an event like this again. Also Rebellion running gave the most unique awards to the winners that I have seen. They received a cool cape with an awesome logo on it that they can wear. I am all for unique awards that can be used in some way.

Rebellion Running has put on a couple of cool events this year and I am looking forward to what they have in store for us in 2020.

You can see the full album of photographs I took at the race here: Last Rebel Standing Album

If you appreciate the work I do please consider supporting it for as little as $1 a month on Patreon: KRNaturalPhoto

I love running and talking about running and photographing running. Enter your email below to join my community and continue talking about our adventures in running.