- April 25, 2024
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Dawn Lisenby stops for a photo at sunset, 100 miles in, during her successful run of the Badwater course in 2018. Courtesy photo.
Finishing her "Big Blue 132" from Delray Beach to Melbourne in 2020. Lisenby ran the distance after the Badwater 135 was canceled. Courtesy photo
Crossing the finish line at the Donna 110 in February. Lisenby was the only runner to finish and took home both the female and male overall winner awards. Courtesy photo
Dawn Lisenby wearing her Donna 110 medals with Chris Turner who raises funds for the Donna Marathon. Courtesy photo
Running to her finish line in Melbourne of Lisenby's Big Blue 132 solo run in 2020. Courtesy photo
Dawn Lisenby on the bridge leading to Amelia Island on the most recent leg of her Big Blue solo runs to traverse the entire East Coast of Florida. Courtesy photo
Running at sunset, 100 miles into her solo run from the Badwater Basin to the summit of Mount Whitney in 2018. Courtesy photo
Dawn Lisenby, center, at the Daytona 100, with pacers and friends. From left, Rebecca Rybicki, Amy Bukszpan, Lisenby, Lulu Yun-Pelz and Andrea Tilley. Courtesy photo
Each Badwater 135 finisher receives this belt buckle.
The pandemic derailed a lot of people's plans in 2020. For Flagler Beach's Dawn Lisenby, it canceled her chance to run in the world's toughest footrace.
Two years later, the running coach and trail-race director, will get her chance. Lisenby, 54, is one of 95 ultra-marathon runners entered into the Badwater 135, which begins July 11 at the Badwater Basin in California's Death Valley National Park — the lowest point in North America at 282 feet below sea level. The race ends 135 miles to the west at the trailhead of the Mount Whitney summit, with an elevation of 8,300 feet.
She’ll have 48 hours to complete the course, enduring temperatures that frequently exceed 120 degrees and traversing a cumulative vertical ascent of 14,600 feet over three mountain ranges.
When she watched the 2000 documentary, “Running on the Sun,” following the trials and tribulations of the Badwater 135 runners in 1999, Lisenby said, “I never thought I would be one of those crazy people.”
But she's not going into the race with any illusions. Unlike other Badwater rookies, Lisenby has already completed the distance. Having crewed the race for another runner in 2017, she decided to run the course on her own the following year, with a full crew of four people.
She ran the original distance — 146 miles — to the top of Mount Whitney, the tallest mountain in the contiguous 48 states with an elevation of 14,505 feet.
Lisenby started a few days before the actual race, but unlike the race competitors, she didn't have to hit checkpoints by required times. While she didn't overheat, her crew did. They became heat stressed 42 miles in, because they were trying to protect their vehicle, a Honda Pilot, by not running the air conditioning continuously.
Stopping at Stovepipe Wells Village Saloon to eat and recover turned out to be fortuitous as a massive sandstorm blew in, delaying their re-start for hours. Lisenby got to the top of Mount Whitney 75 hours and 30 minutes after she started.
Lisenby's application to enter the race was finally accepted in 2020.
“I trained the hardest I've trained ever in my life,” she said. “Then two weeks before the race, it was canceled because of COVID. I still think I have PTSD from it.”
The 2021 race was scheduled without the traditional finish-line party. Lisenby said she had waited so long, she wanted her one chance at this grueling ordeal to be the full experience. As it turned out, an injury would have prevented her from running in it anyway.
To be eligible to run in the race, runners have to complete at least three 100-mile races, including one within the past 13 months. Lisenby has run in two in the past seven months: the Daytona 100 on Dec. 4 from Jacksonville to Ponce Inlet, where she finished 17th among females with a time of 27 hours, nine minutes; and the Donna 110 on Feb. 6 in Jacksonville, where she was the only competitor to finish with a time of 26 hours, 10 minutes.
The Donna was special to Lisenby because the races, which also include a marathon and a half marathon, benefit breast cancer research. Lisenby's sister, Debby, died of breast cancer in November. Her heart was heavy running in the Daytona 100 less than a month later. She also ran with an injured knee. But by finishing, she completed her qualification for Badwater.
STARTING LINE
Lisenby will be in the first wave of starters at 8 p.m. July 11. She will have a crew of four women riding in a vehicle with her and ahead of her and at times running with her in Death Valley. Her crew chief is Heather Carter, who lives in Las Vegas and is in charge of logistics. Lulu Yun-Pelz, who lives near Tampa and has crewed for Lisenby several times, is in charge of nutrition.
“I never thought I would be one of those crazy people.”
DAWN LISENBY
Amy Bukszpan and Victoria Heberlace will be Lisenby's pacers and they will spray her with water during the hottest parts of the day. Bucszpan will join her at mile 42 with the sprayer. Heberlace will likely run with Lisenby through the second night.
The pacers will keep her company, but like most ultra runners, Lisenby also enjoys the solitude.
She didn't get into running until 2002. She had been a ballet dancer and a soccer player. When she and her husband Darryn moved from Gainesville to Flagler County, she looked for something new to do. Inspired by her late brother's love for running, she decided to try it.
She hasn't stopped. She ran through two pregnancies — her sons are now 17 and 13. Her races got longer and longer. She became a certified running coach and trainer and owns East Coast Trail Racing, which coordinates ultramarathons in Flagler County. The first race she organized was Jack’s 50K Trail Race in 2008. It’s named after her brother, Carl Jack Forman II, who died in 1997, and proceeds benefit his school, the University of Georgia.
Now, she directs four trail races: The Swamp, which consists of four races from 10 to 100 kilometers starting at the Graham Swamp trailhead; the River to Sea 6½ Hour Race, which starts at River to Sea Preserve; the New Year Ultra Celebration, a 7-hour race at Gamble Rogers State Recreation Area: and Jack's, a 10, 30 and 50K race along the Mala Compra Greenway Trail.
Lisenby loves trail racing and said that after Badwater, she plans to retire from pavement racing. So, this will be her only chance to complete the Badwater 135 within the 48-hour limit. She said she learned a lot from her solo run four years ago. For example, this time they plan to leave the air conditioning running.
