What do you want to know or want us to investigate about life in Alaska, stories behind the news or why things are the way they are? Family losing hope of finding missing runner on Mount Marathon Learn how your comment data is processed. 2021 Mount Marathon Race Guide by Seward Chamber of Commerce - Issuu There are no sweepers that follow the Red Lantern, the last runner down the mountain, to ensure every person has gotten off the mountain. The Mount Marathon course roughly describes a treble clefrunners don't descend the same route they ascendand as Walsh hiked down that afternoon, he saw another man slowly climbing, about . Two other runners sustained serious injuries in this years race. 21, 2019 at 7:04 PM PDT. The discovery of human remains near Seward has sparked speculation that the body of Michael LeMaitre, possibly the state's most famous missing person, has been found, but that appears unlikely. Grove:What do you think this story tells people about Alaska or about what happened to this guy? Missing person reports in the area, reported cries from the trees, and sightings of what look like oversized monkeys call to mind the legends of vicious baboon . Theres a rule that if youre much slower than then most of the runners you have to make it halfway up in one hour, or youll be disqualified. She maintained a 4.0 Grade Point Average at the school. Theriault Boots: They searched, they didnt find anything. Details. The men's and women's courses are a grueling 1.5-mile climb up, and back down, Alaska's majestic and treacherous Mount Marathon. See also. At the time of her disappearance, troopers said that there was a note in her truck saying she didn't want a search. A cadaver dog was sent into the area and friends paid for and analyzed high-resolution photographs of the mountain. What did they tell you nine years later about this? THE SETTINGMount Marathon in the Kenai Mountain range in southern Alaska looms over town of Seward, an active fishing port, with a population of about 3,000. Participants who dont make it a halfway-point within one hour are disqualified, and race sweepers now follow the last runner to the top of the mountain and back down, said race director Matias Saari. The mountain is always there. Competitors must now meet specified time milestones or they will be forced to drop out, a rule designed to avoid risks to stragglers. Casey Grove: And you took these questions back to the authorities. Michael was competing for the first time in the 85th running of the Mount Marathon race, with participants running up the mountain surrounded, by thick forests and creeks over 3.1 to 3.5 miles. Youre using hands and feet. I guess I'm headed down the rabbit hole now. The average speed uphill is 2 mph. The 93rd Mount Marathon race will be held Wednesday in Seward after a year off because of the pandemic. I think thats fascinating people. James and Michelle Butler: The Senseless Murder of 21-Year-Navy Veteran and Wife. CBS News Bay Area: Free 24/7 News CBS Bay Area App Primate sightings in the Alaskan woods have the team puzzled, since experts say that monkeys have never lived in Alaska. Human remains found near Seward likely not those of missing Mount Despite extensive searches, his body has never been recovered, and the details of his death remain a mystery. disappeared during the Mount Marathon Race. Get notifications about news related to the topics you care about. But crews found no sign of LeMaitre. He was apparently fit and healthy, having been a regular visitor to the gym and had finished a 12K event a month earlier, but despite the warning, he had never visited the course and he chose to continue. The Troopers announced that they identified the remains of Ronald Oquilluk using DNA from his sister. At that point, you have an entire mountain, and you have no limiting factor. Missing on Mount Marathon Michael LeMaitre. Despite speculation about whether the remains might belong to LeMaitre, DNA testing found they instead belonged to a 39-year-old man whose last address was in Arkansas, troopers said. Crom said the pair had climbed mountains together worldwide. Jenna Hutchins - Wikipedia I had to go down, but before I did I looked over the slide area and saw a black bear. The junior race, for runners ages 7 to 17, had already taken placethe kids went only halfway up the broad, triangular mountain that . Ravens. It was rainy, it was foggy, and he just never came down the mountain. All rights reserved. So that I think is discouraging of people who are going to be taking four or five, six hours much longer to complete the race. Casey Grove:And you took these questions back to the authorities. Brandon Lawson The 911 call that led to a mysterious disappearance. When you get to the top, theres a grassy area with a big rock in the middle that you go around. The note, they added, expressed "her depression.''. "Oh my god, Jenna's kicking a**!" Bondi said as she checked Jenna's location from her phone. The chutes had snow bridges on them that have been collapsing all summer. Then you pop out back out and have to decide whether to take the junior trail, the cliffs, or the waterfall, which is 20 feet out, 70 feet down. One of the organisers of the race, Karol Fink, said that in the months before the big day, there had been unusual amounts of snow We had a little more snow than usual. The key point here is that during the race, they typically have race officials at the top of the mountain and all along the course. The serious risk of major injury or death is why the event isn't open to just anyone. A world-renowned endurance athlete who went missing in California's Yosemite National Park has been found dead. The race is short, only three miles long. While injuries are common and expected, LeMaitre's case was unprecedented. I think there was a healthy debate about how is this race unsafe, and they added some pretty sound safety measures, it sounds like. After the official searches were called off, she spent over a month walking the mountain and looking for signs. The crowd cheered when Matt Novakovich won the 3.5-mile race in less than 45 minutes . Zalokar also reportedly climbed every mountain over 14,000 feet in California and ran the New York City Marathon at age 55 in 2:43:10, winning his age group, official records show. Zalokar, of Reno, Nevada, was reported missing late Sunday after not returning to Yosemite Valley from his solo trip as planned. After that point, he never returned. Montana Marathon Theriault Boots: I think its the same intrigue that makes people going missing in Alaska so fascinating for some people, because its just the vastness of the wilderness. Prior to the race this year, former race director Chuck Echard had written a letter to the Seward Phoenix Log expressing his opinion that the race field should be decreasedthe event, he contended, wasnt for everyone. And theres just never been a trace of him found. The biggest factor was the record snowthe trail conditions were unlike anything they had seen beforeice underneath. They show crashes, people on backboards and lots of blood.. I think that vastness and the proximity of that vastness to town and to thousands of people and spectators, that you could be gone without a trace while there are hundreds of runners and thousands of spectators, like a mile less than a mile away from you, is just a reminder for Alaskans of that very thin line we live in between our little patches of town and kind of infinite wilderness and the dangers of that. [5][6] In 2019 she earned All-American status for a second straight year at the national Foot Locker Cross Country Championships.,[5][10]. Then theres a dirt trail with a 60 percent grade. In the 1980s, when Echard was director, the senior mens and womens field was capped at 200; this year, it was 375. When the competitive men come down from the top of the mountain to the bottom, theyre descending over 3,000 feet in about five minutes. The chutes had snow bridges on them that have been collapsing all summer. We spoke separately to Karol Fink, a Mount Marathon organizer and 19-year race veteran who ran this year, and to MaryAnne LeMaitre, whose father has yet to be found. When youre in Seward, on 6th avenue, 7th avenueat almost every point, no matter what youre doing, you can see Mount Marathon. LeMaitre: The parts that were most dangerous, he had already gone up them. It's not uncommon for racers to be injured, running to the. She flew to Seward on July 5. Fink: A few minutes down, theres Denali Falls; it has a 10-foot drop. Queen Bee Montana Marathon - new name - Same Fast Courses! Theres a rule that if youre much slower than most of the runners, you have to make it halfway up in one hour, or youll be disqualified. By 2 am, an Alaska State Troopers helicopter equipped with infrared radar was scanning the mountain. "There are eight people missing'' in the Seward area since 1993, she added, and trooper files hold an unknown number of cases of people who disappeared before that date. If my dad had fallen in one of those chutes and a snow bridge had collapsed over him, the infrared helicopters wouldnt have been able to find him. He is the races first fatality since it began in 1915. Additional age group awards will be given by RRCA! Missing runner found after vanishing following seven-day marathon challenge Race organizers instituted a number of new safety measures in 2013, including mandatory signed statements from runners that theyve completed training runs on the course, a one-hour time limit for racers to reach the summit, and sweeps of the mountain by volunteers after each wave of the race. Lingit Aani Kaa Kei Nas.ax Haa Yoo Xatangi, the Anchorage Daily News Curious Alaska column, https://media.ktoo.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/8-Michelle-Theriault-int.mp3. At 11 a.m., nearly 350 women gathered behind the start line. The volunteers, who had been on the mountain for 10 hours, had completed their duty and were descending when they encountered LeMaitre, who was in last place, just approaching the mountains summit. Calls to her for this story went unanswered. From the picture that I saw of him at halfway, he didnt have water in his hand. Searchers worried that if he wasnt already injured, he probably had hypothermia because of his light clothing, exhaustion and the freezing weather. KTOO collaborates with partners across the state to cover important news and to share stories with our audiences. All we need is just one little thing to go on. The Last Man Up | Runner's World Alaska Public Media 2023. Signs posted on the lower mountain, site of the most dangerous cliffs, point out alternate descent routes and rate their difficulty. The perplexing disappearance of Paul Michael LeMaitre from the Mount LeMaitre: Any time that Ive experienced anything like thisfriends who have gotten into car accidents and died, losing my grandmother to illnessthere was closure for that. Do we advocate for complete personal responsibility, or do race organizers have authority to begin dictating the course? The chutes had snow bridges on them that have been collapsing all summer. The race officials had already packed up by around 6 p.m., when my dad was still headed up. I have spent a lot of time on the mountain; I know my route very clearly. [5] In 2021, Hutchins committed to attending Brigham Young University,[6] and was scheduled to start classes in January 2022. People choose their own route on the mountain, and you cant babysit everyone. There are now sweepers that follow the Red Lantern, the last runner down the mountain, to ensure every person has gotten off the mountain. Mount Marathon towers over the community of Seward at the head of Resurrection Bay about 125 miles south of Anchorage. Photo by Carol Grisswold. MT MARATHON VOICEOVER - YouTube Let us know in the form at the bottom of the story. Thats when Anchorage resident Michael LeMaitre went missing while running the race, never to be seen again. Peggy LeMaitre is no longer holding out hope that her husband is still alive five weeks and multiple searches after he vanished without a trace while running in the popular extreme race. Is there a serial killer in Austin, Texas? But I think theres a lot of people who still very much want to know what happened to Michael LeMaitre. But he hadnt been on the mountain before. 4.2 (8) Rate. And now, if you do Mount Marathon, you have to attest publicly, you have to sign something like in a public room full of other racers that says that you have been up and down the whole course. [The race] was never meant to be a fundraiser for the chamber, he wrote. He was definitely physically fit. Alaska Public Media is our partner station in Anchorage. New rules were instituted, including one that says runners now must sign a pledge saying theyve completed the roughly 3-mile race course at least once prior to race day. To get from where he was last seen in 2012 to where the jawbone was found would require that he first make a left turn off the Mount Marathon ridge when he knew a right turn was required to pick up the trail down. Several years since Michael disappeared, not one piece of physical evidence has surfaced. The Last Man Up - Runner Disappears During Race : r - Reddit This year, the weather was good enough to fly in aid station water by helicopter, but you cant always bank on it. Fred Zalokar, Marathoner Who Took On Mountains, Is Found Dead in During the court case, Chamber officials obtained access to the LaMaitres financial records in an effort to prove that Michael had staged his own disappearance and that he was alive. Mount Marathon Race in Seward - The toughest 5K on the planet. When you get to the top, most racers go around. I think there was a healthy debate about how is this race unsafe, and they added some pretty sound safety measures, it sounds like. Missing in Alaska - Episodes - IMDb Mountain climber and marathoner Fred Zalokar, 61, found dead in Yosemite The 65-year-old was competing as a rookie in the. Hannah Lafleur beats the heat and a past champ to win the Mount The Mount Marathon Race in Seward took place Wednesday, after a year off due to the pandemic, without reports of any major trouble. Outdoors she ranked first at 3200m, running 9:49.83. "She has a great work ethic," said Frankie Nunn, head coach of Tennessee High. The race changed as a result of the disappearance. An Instagram murder - Brandon Clark and Bianca Devins, Gannon Stauch Murder Trial - Daily Updates, Jenna Van Gelderen and the missing Egyptian tapestry, The Missing, Murdered and Reunited of Runaway Train, UPDATE: 11 year old Gannon Stauch missing from Colorado Springs - remains have been found in Florida, The Ultimate Guide to the Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell case. [10] At 16, she took the women's 5000 at the Five & Dime Athletics Meeting in South Carolina with a time of 15:34.47. Fort Valley State University student Missing Where is Anitra Gunn? Her husband of 43 years, Michael LeMaitre, was last seen on July 4, about 200 feet from the top of Mount Marathon in Seward, south of Anchorage. Other remains associated with the man were found in the same area in 1997, according to troopers. Zalokars website says he was also the first runner to win his age group in all six Abbott World Marathon Majors races in Berlin, Boston, Chicago, New York, London and Tokyo. The mens race was also foggy, but the trail had dried some. He was never seen again and his body was never located despite extensive searching. I guess I always thought this was a process that only happened after several years, or when concrete evidence supporting the missing person is deceased surfaced. LeMaitres disappearance changed the way the race operates. Four days after LeMaitre disappeared, the official rescue attempt was called off, though the Seward Volunteer Fire Department kept looking. The 2012 race saw broken bones and lacerations for some competitors. You know, a lot of people kept saying, you need some sort of closure. Now its 40% of samples. While running the Mount Marathon race in Alaska, Michael LeMaitre disappeared. Finally, I came to my realization that I needed to figure out what had happened to my dad. What happened this yearit was quite devastating for the community. Delta variant wasnt detected in Alaska until a few weeks ago. Box 2530 :: Billings, MT 59103 406-255-8488 2023 Montana Women's Run. There was no one there to give him any direction. He's on Mount Marathon somewhere.". Rookies must attest to having scouted the mountain ahead of time. It was especially rainy, foggy and slick that day. It could predate modern record-keeping on the missing or belong to someone with no dental records on file to match. Fink: After youve summited and rounded the rock, you drop into the snow, and you either sit on your feet or slide down on your butt.