A series of multi-day events didn’t conclude in time for the June 14-16 weekend wrap-up – one lasted for two additional days and two more went for an entire additional week. But we haven’t forgotten them. Instead, we have them in this bonus edition of the roundup. We start with the Last Annual Heart of the South Road Race where Greg Wolodkin of Sutton, Mass., successfully completed the 384-mile adventure within the 10 1/2-day limit. We then head to Wisconsin where a few New Englanders raced at Six Days in the Dome, including Cambridge, Mass., resident Jenny Hoffman who was victorious while improving her position for the Team USA 24-Hour National Team. We then close out with the Tahoe 200, where Belmont, Mass., resident Scot DeDeo earned his finish at the distance, as did Aurora Leon of Keene, N.H. 

The Last Annual Heart of the South Road Race

The Grim Reaper was coming for Greg Wolodkin, day after day. Sometimes just a few miles back, sometimes 18-25 miles behind, the Reaper kept coming but Wolodkin kept moving. Ultimately, the Reaper failed; Wolodkin succeeded.

The Grim Reaper holds an ominous position on the tracking spreadsheet for the Last Annual Heart of the South Road Race. Runners had 10 1/2 days – June 13-23 – to complete the 384-mile journey from Destin, Fla., to Castle Rock, Ga., carrying only a course map and the supplies they brought. They could stop along the way to buy more supplies, sleep wherever they found a spot to lay down, and keep moving until the Grim Reaper caught them on the twice-daily tracking updates. Outlast the Reaper, and the finish line awaited.

Wolodkin entered this year’s fifth annual event with plenty of multi-day and week-long race experience. The 57-year-old from Sutton, Mass., is a three-time finisher of the Vol State 500K, in 2021, 2022 and 2023, having completed the similar-styled event after between 6 1/2 days and 7 3/4 days each time. Still, when Wolodkin and 53 other starters took on this year’s Last Annual Heart of the South race, a finish was far from guaranteed. Most would fail, but that wasn’t the point. The adventure and the willingness to try gave them all at least a possibility of finishing.

A week into the race, less than half the field remained. Addison Hendricks, 25 of Pensacola, Fla., was already done with a winning performance of 6 days, 6 hours, 25 minutes and 29 seconds. The next three finishers were also done, having followed Hendricks by 3 1/2 hours, 4 hours and 14 hours to also finish in just under a week.

The Reaper would catch more runners in the days that followed, but not Wolodkin. Ultimately, he was the 14th finisher, completing the experience in 9 days, 17 hours, 47 minutes and 28 seconds. Wolodkin was safely at the finish, and the Reaper was 18 miles behind, still chasing the four remaining on the course. Three of them would finish ahead of the 252-hour cutoff, with the fourth coming agonizingly close before running out of time.

Six Days in the Dome

Jenny Hoffman keeps getting stronger with each passing year, if the 24-hour race at Six Days in the Dome is the benchmark. Hoffman, 46, of Cambridge, Mass., returned to the event – which spanned June 13-23 – at the Pettit Center in Milwaukee, Wisc., and took on the 443.445 meter indoor track for the third straight year.

In 2022, Hoffman was the women’s runner-up and third overall finisher with 136.6081 miles in the 24-hour race. In 2023, she returned following her successful world record-setting transcontinental run and hammered out 145.4868 miles to lead the women’s field and finish second overall. This year, Hoffman was even better as she cranked out 147.7673 miles to again lead the women and place second overall. Chris Roberts, 39, of Kirkwood, Mo., was a few laps ahead with 149.6177 miles to lead the men.

Both Hoffman and Roberts easily surpassed the qualifying standard for the U.S. National Team that will compete at the 2025 IAU 24-Hour World Championship. The men’s standard is 140 miles and the women’s standard is 125 miles. Both runners had previously surpassed the standard but improved their rankings among U.S. runners with Hoffman sitting second among potential women’s qualifiers.

Beyond the 24-hour race, the event included 10-day, 6-day, 72-hour, 48-hour and 12-hour races.

Hoffman and Roberts weren’t the only runners with head-turning performances at the event. Zach Bitter, 38, of Austin, Texas, delivered the fourth-fastest men’s 100-mile performance in U.S. history with his 11:51 effort. He previously ran a personal-best 11:19 at the event in 2019.

In addition to Hoffman, a few other New Englanders also had big performances at the event. In the 48-hour race, Kerri Haskins, 53, of Danville, N.H., completed 100.0247 miles, as did 72-year-old Ed Peters of Norwalk, Conn. In the 24-hour race, Roy Van Buren, 62, of Woburn, Mass., completed 101.127 miles.

Tahoe 200

Two-hundred miles, nearly 37,000 feet of climbing and a full loop around historic Lake Tahoe were the temptation that lured a pair of New England ultrarunners to take on the 10th running of the Tahoe 200 Endurance Run from June 14-18 in Lake Tahoe, Calif.

Runners had 105 hours to complete the journey on the Tahoe Rim Trail. Of the 233 who started the adventure, 150 ultimately completed it. Scot DeDeo, 43, of Belmont, Mass., had a fantastic run in his 200-mile debut. Building upon previous finishes at the 2017 Hennepin Hundred and 2019 Midstate Massive Ultra-Trail 100, DeDeo completed the Tahoe 200 in 37th place overall in 79:30:00. Additionally, 41-year-old Aurora Leon of Keene, N.H., capped her 200-mile debut with a 121st-place finish in 99:27:55.

At the front of the pack, the top trio turned in some historically fast times as 32-year-old Haroldas Subertas of Haines, Alaska, logged the third-fastest men’s time in course history with his 53:46:51 performance, leading runner-up Michael McKnight, 34, of Smithfield, Utah, who followed in 56:01:29. McKnight’s effort was the sixth-fastest in course history, though his 2019 victory was earned with the second-fastest time ever. Third overall finisher and women’s champion Mika Thewes, 33, of Lakewood, Colo., cranked out the second-fastest women’s time ever in 57:05:14. Thewes also has the third-fastest women’s time in course history from her 2022 victory. Subertas, McKnight and Thewes were the lone sub-60-hour finishers.

*Editor’s Note: Results are found on a variety of sites, including ultrasignup.com, UltraRunning Magazine, and official race websites. We do the best we can to find as many results as possible to report on and recognize the local ultrarunning community.