The 2023 Leadville 100 #

In 2023 I participated in the Leadville 100. Post race I was curious about the correlation between the time people arrived at an aid station vs the overall finish time. This analysis is an attempt at chasing that curiosity and I hope you find it as interesting as I did!

Finisher Percentage #

Overall the finisher percentage was 46.28. The breakdown across gender identities is shown in the above photo.

Buckets #

In order to compare finish times against aid station times, we need to bucket participants into groups that can be used for comparisons. The above photo shows the amount of participants in each bucket. The x axis denotes a finish time, where “dnf” means “did not finish”. Since the race has a 30 hour cutoff, each bucket is defined as a 1 hour window.

It is noticeable that finishing at 27 hours and below shows a large drop in participants per bucket. This is likely where the more elite runners are finishing due to this course’s difficulty. A 27 hour finish time would also mean a 16:12 average pace per mile.

Aid stations #

The next few graphs will be comparing the time to get to each aid station from the start of the race against each bucket. This is done using a box plot to denote the variability within each bucket.

Mayqueen outbound #

The DNF group in the above photo has a wide variability. The super elites are getting to this aid station in around 1:45 …astonishingly fast to start a 100 mile effort. Every finishing bucket has a higher quartile value that is sub 2:30. This means that 2:30 should most likely be a “fallback” time to get to mayqueen rather than a target time. The big belt buckles (sub 25 hours) have a median value that is around 2:00.

Outwardbound outbound #

At outwardbound we can start to see the difference in median times between the slower and fast groups. This difference will continue increasing between each aid station. For a successful finish one should target arriving here in sub 5 hours. For a large belt buckle then getting here in sub 4 hours would increase your chances.

Halfpipe outbound #

There is only 5.7 miles between outwardbound outbound and half pipe. Nearly all finishers do this section of course in about an hour or less.

Twinlakes outbound #

Twinlakes is the last aid station before the large hope pass climb. Nearly all finishers are here in 8 hours or less, while the big belt buckle finishers are arriving here at around 7 hours or less into the race.

Hope pass outbound #

This graph highlights how significant the difference is between the elite runners and the mere mortals. The slower finishers are between 9:30 and 11 hours into the race when arriving at the hope pass aid station while the elites are all arriving here in 8 hours.

Winfield #

Winfield is the turn around point at mile 50. At this point the runner’s have ascended over 7,000’ vertical gain over 50 miles. Nearly all finishers are arriving here in 13 hours or less, while the big belt buckle finishers are mostly arriving in 11 hours or less.

Hope pass inbound #

Reclimbing hope pass is one of the hardest sections of the race, even though the climb up from winfield is slightly less gain than starting from twinlakes. The rocky, rugged terrain makes a slow, arduous climb. Most finishers arrive in 15:15 or less, while big belt buckles arrive in 13:00 or less. The super elites are under 12 hours which is completely bonkers.

Twinlakes inbound #

At twinlakes inbound there are no more DNF’s found in the dataset I acquired. This means that everyone that left hope pass inbound was either timed out via the 10:00 PM cutoff at twinlakes or dropped out of the race. The slower finishers get here in 17:15 or less, and the big belt buckles are mostly arriving in under 15 hours from the start of the race. The big belt buckles should be arriving in the light, while the normal finishers can get here during nautical twilight.

Halfpipe inbound #

Nearly all finishers arrive in 20:00 or less, and big belt buckles arrive (mostly) in 17:00 or less. To target a big belt buckle one should aim to arrive at the half pipe aid station before nautical twilight ends.

Outwardbound inbound #

At outwardbound the only people still running in the daylight are the super elites that are attempting to win the race. Nearly all other finishers will be getting here in the dark, and the slower finishers will be getting here in around 21 hours. Big belt buckles should target getting here in around 18 hours.

Mayqueen inbound #

The final aid station before the finish and the end of all climbing. The elites are so much faster compared to everyone else it is causing each box and whisker on the graph to be shrunk because the Y axis needs to hold such a wide amount of time durations. This is also found in the next graph of the finish. If you’ve made it here, it’s a final push to the finish, and nearly everyone that makes it here will finish. To get a large belt buckle leaving yourself about 3 hours to traverse the final 12.6 miles would be a good idea.

Finish #

Finally the finish!

Disclaimer #

All data used in this analysis was freely available on the internet. No guarantees have been made about this analysis or its accuracy. I know there are some missing entries(100-150) from the total participants, so this is a rough estimate of the total number of entries. All split times are unofficial.