Liz Carrington completed Highland Trail 550 in late May
Durango’s Liz Carrington poses for a picture on top of Devils Staircase in Scotland as she completes the Highland Trail 550 bikepacking race in late May. (Courtesy Liz Carrington)
Like many people, COVID-19 stopped one of Durango’s Liz Carrington bucket list items. Five years later, in late May, Carrington checked the Highland Trail 550 bikepacking race in Scotland off her bucket list.
Carrington, 45, is a nurse practitioner at CommonSpirit Mercy Hospital in Durango. She and the other competitors started the Highland Trail 550 on May 24 in the small town of Tyndrum, Scotland. The bikepackers traveled 245 miles north through the stunning landscapes of Scottish river valleys and lochs (lakes) before heading south closer to the Western coast and then ending in Tyndrum.
She finished in six days, 12 hours and 10 minutes and was the third fastest woman.
“It was hard, amazing and beautiful; all the things,” Carrington said. “It was definitely a bucket list experience.”
Originally from Atlanta, Carrington always wanted to be outside. She grew up going out west with her family for ski trips and she then attended Colorado College. Carrington raced road bikes at Colorado College and raced as an amateur for many years. Ever since she’s had a full-time job and even after moving to Durango in 2012 to work at CommonSpirit Mercy, she kept racing against pros.
Carrington’s races kept getting longer and longer and she started doing mountain bike races like the Leadville Trail 100 and 24-hour races. She realized she did better at the longer races and then heard about bikepacking, which allowed her to ride all day, camp then continue the next day.
Once Carrington started bikepacking, she quickly set her sights on the Highland Trail 550.
“I had actually signed up to do this race in May of 2020,” Carrington said. “I had my plane tickets in hand and everything. I had been accepted to the race and I was in way better shape five years ago. Then, of course, COVID happened, so I didn’t get to go and I was super bummed. I put it on the back burner and went about life. Then it started to creep back into my mind again.”
The first step to get back into the Highland 550 was to get accepted into the race by organizer Alan Goldsmith.
Goldsmith approves everyone who gets into the field and Carrington wasn’t sure if he’d remember Carrington from five years ago. He did and she was approved in November.
Carrington thinks it’s easier to get into the race as a woman compared to as a man because they’re are fewer women who apply. Regardless, she became one of 22 women to start the race.
Before the start, Carrington had to train. She used an indoor bike training program, went to Catacombs Fitness in Durango to do mountain bike and strength training. Carrington would get up and workout at 4:30 a.m. before work to prepare. It was Carrington’s longest endeavor after she failed to finish the Colorado Trail and did about 480 miles.
“I was pretty nervous that I didn’t do enough training beforehand,” Carrington said. “But the nice thing about Scotland is that it’s at sea level, so my body felt amazing because I could breathe. That helps a lot too, just being able to breathe and recover at night.”
On May 24, the group start finally came at 8:30 a.m. All the riders met at a restaurant in Tyndrum and rolled out together as Goldsmith gave some safety advice. The race was completely self-supported. Every rider could access shops for food, but couldn’t rely on each other for food. Carrington and the rest of the riders had to rely on their GPS’ for guidance
In her bikepack, Carrington only packed what she called “the basics to survive.” She had a small tent, a sleeping bag, clothing, a GPS, a phone, chargers and food.
The towns and shops the riders went through were about a day apart and sometimes had odd hours, according to Carrington. She said the key was packing enough food to last between stops and rationing it out in case the places weren’t open when she was passing through.
Energy and protein bars, Snickers, gummy candy, sandwiches, Scottish sausage rolls and savory pies were all part of Carrington’s diet.
Carrington was around others in the first two days and made good time. The weather was terrible with constant rain, but the views were still stunning. There were parts of the route that reminded Carrington of Segments 22 and 23 of the Colorado Trail above Silverton.
“It’s not really tundra there, but it kind of looks like tundra because there are no trees, just these alpine lakes,” Carrington said. “You can see forever and big mountains. There’s a part called Fisher Field that I think is a favorite of a lot of people. You have to go up this big climb … you drop down into this valley that’s very remote, but there’s green, towering mountains above you and all the water.”
Carrington loved how quiet it was in the valleys, descents and climbs. There was nothing else living out there.
Sleep was pretty easy for Carrington to figure out. It would get dark around 11 p.m., so she would go to bed then and get up around 4 a.m. as the sun rose.
She slowed down the further north she went as the course became more technical. As Carrington started going south back toward the finish, she got hypothermia, but that couldn’t stop her. She let her core get too cold and had to go into a bothy (Scottish hut), strip off her wet clothes, get into her dry clothes and sleeping bag and warm up for a few hours.
Once she got moving again, Carrington was better and she kept going south and got closer to the finish. Carrington was frustrated with how long the last 20 miles took her, with a few chunky rocky sections. But she finally finished in Tyndrum, celebrated with beers with other racers and soaked in her incredible achievement.
After she finished, Carrington stuck around Scotland for a few days to recover and enjoy herself. She had dinner with other racers and swapped stories about their adventures. Carrington booked a nice hotel and enjoyed some great food and whiskey before she flew back home.
“At least right now, I think this race is a one-and-one because the weather was so bad,” Carrington said. “If I could plan ahead to have nice weather, I would do it again, maybe. But who knows … I do have unfinished business with the Colorado Trail, so ideally I hope to do the Colorado Trail next year. But we’ll see. I do this just because I love it; I love being outside, moving and seeing new places. If the opportunity happens, or there’s some new race that looks cool, I might try to do it.”
bkelly@durangoherald.com
