5 August 2025

Since moving to Montana in 2020 I have thoroughly enjoyed being an active member with the local Capital City Amateur Radio Club (CCARC). Amongst the various things the club involves itself with, my favorite is the Elkhorn Endurance Run, hosted by the Helena Ultra Runners League (HURL). The race offers runners a chance to test their mettle in some truly remote Montana areas, just southeast of Helena in the Elkhorn Mountains. This is also a great test for our club’s emergency radio communications ability.

On the first Saturday in August runners take on a 13.1, 50K or 50 Mile race. The 50 Mile race is a beast that offers approximately 13,000 feet in elevation changes between 5,300 and 9,000 feet above sea level. This backcountry course rarely has cell phone coverage so CCARC ham radio volunteers help by providing 100% accountability of runners through all of the aid stations. Each station helps relay messages back to race control and helps coordinate between race officials and Search and Rescue (SAR) who also support this event.

The previous two years my middle son and I have supported this event at the “Elk Park” aid station. It is one of the hardest stations to get to. Your options are either a 8 mile, bone jarring ride up Tizer Road (I use the term road very loosely) followed by a three-mile, 1,000 feet gain hike. The other route is from the race start at Willard Creek Trailhead that is a 6.1 mile hike with 2,100 feet of gain. After the first year we vowed to never drive up Tizer Road again.

This year we again planned to hike in from the start/finish the day before the race with the addition of my youngest son. Since the 50-mile race starts at 5am, you have to be in place early. The three of us hit the trail just before noon on Friday with clouds building in the distance. The first leg of the journey actually traverses downhill to the McClellan Creek drainage, before turning south to head up stream and uphill.

As the trail tracks away from the creek around the 3 mile mark it starts into a series of switchbacks up to a ridge. Somehow we managed to avoid the afternoon rain but we regularly heard thunder on the east and west of us. We made plans to hunker down under a tarp if we did get hit by a storm but we only had sprinkles of rain. We reached the aid station location at Elk Park just before 5 pm. This was a big climb for my youngest son but he did well. Fred (KD0HBA), another ham supporting this station, had already arrived and set up camp. Fred is an avid horseman and made the trek with the help of his two mules who were happily munching on fresh mountain grass when we got there.

Not knowing if we would see rain that evening we quickly set up our tent and got dinner in our hungry bellies. Afterwards, I set up two antennas to establish communications with our race control hams and let them know we made it safely. One antenna was a Log-Periodic Dipole (LPD) for making it into the DMR repeater, and the other was a roll-up J-pole (Ed Fong Antennas). Both worked great so I turned off my two HT radios to save batteries for the next day.

My two boys and I barely fit in our “3 Man” tent and struggle to get a good night’s sleep. I was already awake when my alarm went off at 5:15 am. Up and at ’em, radios on and checked in with our race control team. The first runner reached our station amazingly at 6:08am. Six miles and two-thousand feet gain in just over an hour is an incredible feat in my opinion.

At the Elk Park station we see runners twice on their out and back transitions. After seeing them initially, they come back through and are at either 18 miles or 36 miles depending on the 50K or 50-mile race. It is truly inspiring to see what these athletes are able to accomplish in a single day’s race. Around 3pm two runners came in who were in rough shape, physically and emotionally drained after. One was a 50-miler, the other a 50K. After being evaluated by SAR members they made the call to drop from the race. The only problem about dropping is you still need to get out. Either hike out six miles or three miles down to Willard Creek and wait for an ATV ride down the rugged Tizer Road. They chose the Willard Creek route.

There were two SAR members at our station and still runners coming through, so one SAR member would hike down with the two runners and requested one of us to hike with them for safety reasons. My middle son volunteered, topped off his water, grabbed his rain jacket and hiked out, then back up, adding an additional six miles to his day’s total. That was a good diversion for his afternoon. Mornings are busy as groups of runners come through our aid station. Afternoons are typically a lot slower at the aid station as runners separate quite a bit as their paces vary.

The race support went great throughout the day even while working through issues with our portable repeater located across the valley on a neighboring mountain range. The last runner reached our location just after 5:30pm and we were cleared to break down and head home. My youngest son found his mountain stride and flew down the mountain. We made it back to the race finish in a beautiful sunset. I look forward to another great time supporting this event next year.