Wonderland Trail (WA)

[Ras Jason Vaughan]

Congratulations, Ethan! Nice work coming back to have another go at it. Stubbornness is a key ultrarunning skill

[John Wedge]

Sept 5, 2012 14:49:03 GMT -5 elinck said:

I'm taking a stab at the unsupported Wonderland Trail FKT this weekend, beginning 6AM on Saturday 8 September and running clockwise (likely from Longmire).

- Ethan Linck, Portland OR

[John Wedge]

Just wanted to say I snapped a photo of Ethan on his way down Ipsut Pass on the afternoon of 9/27. Great job Ethan !

[krissymoehl]

Thursday August 22 starting around 11am in the clockwise direction from Longmire, Darcy Africa & I will set out on an attempt for a fully supported, women's FKT run of the Wonderland Trail. We will have crew at Mowich Lake, White River campground, & Box Canyon.
The link to our Spot track is share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0E4WYKeS7flT6DaeXDkYffXjRRVGMa5o0

[Michael Davidson]

Congrats! Just saw a note about your success on irunfar. Great job.

[tommy13]

Well done ladies. Congratulations on your FKT on the Wonderland truly and incredible feat of running

[krissymoehl]

We just made it back to cell service. An awesome run shared with Darcy and our crew Matt, Mark, Basit, documented by Fred & Austin, cheered on by Ma & Pa Moehl.
We started 1:08pm Thursday and finished 11:30am Friday. Run time 22:22:45
In checking the Spot link we saw the infrequent tracking due to the dense forest. Thanks to our crew & photographers we have plenty of backup documentation.
Beautiful run & Amazing experience!!

[Kunlong Babatunde]

Shaaaaazzzzzzzzzzzzzzzaaaaaaammmmmmmm To the both of you!!!!!!!!!! What a great run and awesome support. I am so psyched and way to go!!!! Save some for 30 on Sanitas

:):):):):)::):)

[kresser]

This past weekend, on September 14th at 3:35 am, I set off from Longmire in a clockwise direction to complete the Wonderland loop in one unsupported push.  I was originally planning on doing a more conservative pace and enjoying myself, but as often happens, I just start pushing it and the rest is history.  I finished the next morning, September 15th, at 6:51 am, for a total elapsed time of 27:16 minutes.  Unfortunately, since I was not even expecting to come anywhere close to the unsupported FKT (frankly, I didn't even know what it was), I did not plan for any sort of verification means.  I met hikers along the route and talked to them, but did not exchange emails with any of them.  My I used my Spot Beacon to check in along the route, but it that does not verify the start/finish.  Also, I was just getting used to using my newish Suunto Ambit, and I didn't realize it had a "lock" feature to keep me from occasionally hitting the "pause" button and having it stop recording.  Also it was set to 60s recording to conserve battery life, so not that accurate anyway for distance.

Gear carried:
About 9,000 calories
Camelbak
Ultralight shell
Long sleeved thermal shirt
BD Comet Headlamp
Petzl Emergency Headlamp
Hat/Gloves
Leatherman Juice
SPOT Beacon

I realize this might be too vague of a submittal for verification purposes.  Links below are to the trip report, photos, and strava link.

Blog Post:
www.runningfarther.com/terribly-grand-time-wonderland-trail-sept-14-15th-2013/

Pictures:
www.facebook.com/thekresser/media_set?set=a.10101391573342830.1073741827.16903349&type=1

Strava:
www.strava.com/activities/82781156

[Adrian Shipley]

Is there an "official" starting point for Wonderland FKT attempts, or being that it is a loop, can you pick your start location?

[Peter Bakwin]

No official start location or direction. I suppose people could argue for different FKTs for different directions, but since it's a loop I'd say that is nitpicking.

[yassine]

This Tuesday September 16, 2014 Brian Donnelly and I (Yassine Diboun) are attempting the Wonderland Trail around Mt. Rainier in Washington. Our plan is to leave Portland at 8 a.m., drive up to Longmire, and run clockwise starting at high noon. We will have a Spot Tracker GPS and will be carrying all of our own supplies. We will not receive any help from anyone, and we are not sharing supplies in any way with each other. Brian has his food and gear, and I have mine. I realize there is some controversy and different beliefs and opinions regarding if this is unsupported or not, but regardless, we will be trying to round-the-mountain in the fastest possible time. We are both really looking forward to this adventure as it's been on our radar for years now. We will report back with more information and details soon. You can follow us via our Spot Tracker share page here:  share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=02aGfa1dpbGdjFOY1ZbHbhBIYMOY5yuZL  

More will be revealed...

*UPDATE: Brian Donnelly and I (Yassine Diboun) started the Wonderland Trail (at Longmire) going clockwise on Tuesday September 16, 2014 at 11:30 a.m. We ran consistently straight through to finish at Longmire in 25 hours 48 minutes. This trail was way more challenging than we expected! HERE is the SPOT Tracker data for verification and both Brian and I hope to have a more detailed report up soon, which we will link from this page. Cross that one off the list!

[bdon]

An amazing adventure!
Here's my report: brianthedonnelly.blogspot.com/2014/09/wonderland-trail-unsupported-speed.html

[Ras Jason Vaughan]

Blessings Every One!

This Friday, July 10, 2015, Richard Kresser and I, Ras Jason Vaughan, will attempt what we are calling the Rainier Wonder Route. The goal of this project is to experience the Mountain in the fullest possible sense by both circumambulating it via the Wonderland Trail and traversing the summit via the Disappointment Cleaver Route and the Emmons Glacier, all completely unsupported, carrying all of our food and gear from beginning to end. Our plan is to begin at the White River Campground, run clockwise on the Wonderland Trail to Reflection Lakes, and there begin the traverse which will take us over the summit and back to White River. From there we will head counterclockwise on the Wonderland until we once again reach Reflection Lakes, thus completing both the Wonderland Trail and the Rainier Wonder Route.

Our progress can by monitored via our SPOT transponder at:
share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0zQbUiFUjuCCJeFY2yq29RzaWBqsNfFqp
It will not be turned on until Friday morning when we begin. Thus, there will be no pings until that time.

Updates and results will be posted to our Facebook profile pages as cell phone coverage allows (which will be infrequently).
Ras Vaughan's facebook: www.facebook.com/JahsonItes
Richard Kresser's facebook: www.facebook.com/thekresser

[Ras Jason Vaughan]

Belated Update:

Richard and I ran into weather and time constraints that led us to abandon most of the Wonderland Trail on this attempt. Instead we started at White River Campground, ran and hiked clockwise around to Paradise, then up the Disappointment Clever Route and down the Emmons Glacier Route back to White River Campground. We carried all of our gear and food from start to finish, completing the trip in good unsupported style. The one aspect of our climbing that was not unsupported was that we used protection which had been set by guide services and other climbers when it was already in place. We are calling this the Cowlitz Connection Route, since it connects the bottom ends of the Emmons Glacier Route and Disappointment Clever Route via the Cowlitz Divide (definitely the long way around). For complete details see:

Ras' trip report:
ultrapedestrian.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-cowlitz-connection-route.html

Richard's trip report:
www.runningfarther.com/2015/07/16/you-aint-failing-you-aint-trying/

and the Trail Runner Magazine online article:
www.trailrunnermag.com/people/adventure/article/1847-a-new-qoktq-route-on-rainier

Our time of 54 hours and 32 minutes is VERY soft, so we encourage those with the mountaineering chops to do it to go out and put up a better time on this. But despite falling far short of our goal, we achieved the two primary directives of adventure: we had a freakin' blast, and we came home safe and sound.