By Brooke Summers

The span of ages runners of this year’s GORE-TEX TransRockies Run is a phenomenon all its own. The ages of the male runners cover a remarkable five decades. Competitive sports worldwide can rarely boast such a rare range of athletes. Just these past few weeks, Beijing Olympic reporters swooned over the few athletes that have reached their forties and kept doubting their likelihood of another Olympic appearance. While this year’s TransRockies Run is currently being led, predictably, by the younger runners, the older runners are not far behind and are perhaps making the most of these extraordinary six days in the Colorado Rockies.  In fact, adventure racing is very familiar with aggressive, fit, and older competitors that seem to gain flight as they age.

There’s hardly a doubt that regular exercise keeps you feeling young and healthy. Just recently, Stamford University released a 20-year study that proved just that: regular running does indeed slow the effects of aging. It’s even true that older competitors find it easier to improve their running times than do the younger ones. Yet one has to wonder if 20 plus mile runs is really good for the body and soul. This year’s 80+ teams would point to their achievements at this race as proof positive.

The $20,000 cash purse awaiting the TransRockies top finishers is quite an incentive for the likes of Erik Skaggs, Andy Symonds, and other sponsored top finishers. While just completing the grueling six legs across the Continental Divide is a feat in itself, what keeps the likes of Team Knuckleheads and Team California Old Goats running day in and day out, hours behind the impressive times of the leaders? For Team Knuckleheads, this adventure race is a way to feed a “third life crisis.”

It’s a matter of fighting off the day-in-day-out and experiencing a rough and almost animalistic part of life. Doug Malewicki of Team California Old Goats has told me that running keeps his mind working. This is an invaluable benefit far beyond the $20,000 prize for Doug. Keeping his Stanford Ph.D, Apollo mission, Cessna test pilot, aero-genious brain feeling young has its perks. What’s even more amazing is that these older runners appear just as fit and strong as their younger counterparts. As I begin to feel my own cartilage deterioration and stiffness from years of sports abuse, I find inspiration and hope here in the Rockies. There just might be an active life beyond thirty after all.