It’s 3AM. Brent and I are sitting inside my car in Crawford Notch in our running gear while the 35 degree wind blows outside. Neither of us have spoken a word to each other in almost 10 minutes. I just sit, staring out the windshield into the pitch black while I shiver. We’ve already covered almost 15 miles of wet, rocky, and technical trail running in the dark after climbing 7 pitches of alpine rock. I think about the next steps, stepping out of the warm car and heading uphill onto the Presidential Range and towards New Hampshire’s highest peak.
“I could just quit right now,” I think to myself. Staying in the warmth of the car sounds lovely, and taking a long break after 16 hours of moving sounds pretty great. This is the second time I’ve contemplated giving up on this objective, and I’m weighing whether this one has more or less validity than the first impulse I had more than 8 hours prior.
A few more minutes pass, and we both slowly stop shivering and transition to taking in as many calories as we can manage. As I stuff my face with chips, Oreos, and Coke, I jokingly say to Brent, “who the hell’s idea was this thing?”
The idea for the SuperReverse was all mine.
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A couple years ago, my friend proposed this crazy itinerary: instead of just simply doing a Presidential Traverse (an 18-mile technical point-to-point hike over most of NH’s tallest mountains), why don’t we mix some climbing into the middle of it? So we brought our rack and after summiting NH’s Mount Washington, we descended 1500 feet into Huntington Ravine before climbing a classic alpine route back out and continuing on our way. It ended up being a much longer day than any of us had anticipated, and the extra weight of carrying climbing gear really made the Traverse drag on.
Beth topping out on Pinnacle Buttress a couple years ago during our “Pinnie Presi” outing that spawned the idea for The SuperReverse
But once the mental struggle of that long day faded from memory, my friend sent me a blog post made by two guys in NH, outlining an even more ridiculous itinerary. They called it The White Mountains Climber’s Superverse.
THE BASICS
There are two very classic moderate alpine rock routes in NH’s White Mountains: The Northeast Ridge of the Pinnacle is a 7-pitch 5.7 alpine climb on the flanks of Mount Washington, and The Whitney Gilman Ridge is another 7-pitch 5.7 climb located on Cannon Cliff. The premise of the Superverse was pretty simple: climb both in one push. The issue? They are about 30 miles away from each other, and the trails between them are very far from smooth, quick trails.
Linking the two climbs involved doing half of a Presidential Traverse as well as half of a Pemi Loop, two of the most feared and respected single-push efforts in the state, due to the elevation gain of each effort.
Their trip report played out as you’d expect the retelling of any sufferfest to: it started as a fun time, they enjoyed the first climb, then things got rough in the in-between and the retelling got much less detailed as they descended into frustration, then exhaustion and elation for the final climb.
It sounded like my kind of adventure, except for the part about hiking with heavy packs. I had learned my lesson on my previous adventure, and it seemed like it would be a lot more fun to do it with light packs. I got to planning.
OUR TAKE
I wanted to make this just as much of a challenge as the original guys who had dreamed up this crazy adventure. After looking at elevation gain and distance, I settled on an itinerary that I imagined would be just as hard or harder than their plan. Instead of going East to West and hitting more downhills, my objective started West at Cannon and then proceeded East, passing over the northern Pemi before starting a northbound Presidential Traverse (the harder of the two directions). After climbing Pinnacle, we would continue onwards and finish the northbound Presi.
I felt all of this would make up for the one big change I was adamant on: having a support team and being able to do gear-exchanges after the different sports. And I had just the name that I felt would capture both the ridiculousness and the long-winded nature of this objective: The White Mountains Extended Climber’s SuperReverse. It rolled off the tongue beautifully.
I tried to make this pipe dream a reality a couple times over the next year and a half, but there were very few people willing to give this a shot with me, for understandable reasons. The objective requires about 45 miles and 18,000 feet of vertical gain, as well as the ability to climb and manage all your safety systems while completely exhausted from the mandatory all-nighter.
Luckily, my friend Brent was up for the task.
MY PARTNER
I met Brent at our local end-of-season Beer Mile in summer of 2021. He introduced himself as Brent and I thought he was messing with me.
“Wait, no, I’m Brent,” I said to him, and he responded with just a look that was just as confused as mine. It wasn’t often we Brents met others.
Over the following year, Brent and I started doing more adventures together. He was always game for whatever stupid thing I was interested in.
“Want to go run 12 miles into a remote part of the whites and fish for wild brook trout in the process?”
“Sure, I’m game,” would be his response.
Whatever I threw out, he was into it. If it involved running and being in the mountains, he was interested. Just the right person to trick into a grueling sufferfest.
The guy who will say yes to ridiculous days in the mountains, Brent
THE BIG DAY
It’s 11AM on September 30th, 2022, and Brent and I are driving to Franconia Ridge for the start of the White Mountains Extended Climber’s SuperReverse. We’ve spotted my car at our halfway point for some refueling options and shelter, just in case our support guy can’t make it there at 2AM to help us.
Oh yeah, that support guy? He’s a random person I’ve never met who offered his help on Instagram when all my other friends were busy. We don’t even know if he’s going to show up.
We roll up to the trailhead and start gearing up for our first climb. I’ve mapped out all the legs of the objective, and I’ve decided we should start at noon. That will put us on all the most beautiful parts of the objective at golden hours, and the timing will work best for our support crew.
A guy comes walking up. “Are you Brent?” he says, and introduces himself as Michael, our support guy, with a huge smile on his face. My concerns immediately dissipate, as Michael is already awesome and super supportive. He’s getting more into the climbing community in New England, and wants to connect with some more people. We chat while Brent and I are gearing up and go over logistics, and then we’re off.
THE WHITNEY GILMAN
Running with climbing gear is a chore usually reserved for running late for an appointment, but we make an exception for the SuperReverse
BEEP! goes our watches as we press record and start jogging down the paved path towards our climb with our rope and gear. Before long we’re into the woods and hiking up through the talus field, heading to the base of the climb. I’m just crossing my fingers that there isn’t another party ahead of us on the climb, as Whitney Gilman is one of the most popular climbs in the state and our weather window has pushed us into the weekend adventure crowd. We get up to the wall and there isn’t a single party ahead of us; there are three.
There’s one party about two pitches up, one party whose leader is halfway up the first pitch, one party waiting at the base, and even still another party coming up behind us. This is bonkers.
I hate being that guy, but I explain that we are on the beginning of a 30+ hour itinerary and we would be SO so appreciative if anyone would let us skip in the line. The waiting party agrees, but then quickly rescinds their offer, so we are stuck waiting. That’s fair - they were here first. You can always ask, but you can’t be that frustrated when you got there later.
So we sit and wait, and after about half an hour finally get on the wall. The party directly ahead of us is moving quick and we’re keeping pace with them. We get to the anchor and the party two groups ahead of us has stalled out on a deceptive corner that sucks you off the actual route. They’ve opted to just restart the pitch but let the party ahead of us go ahead.
“Sweet,” I think to myself, “we’ll be able to skip them soon and then be on our way.”
Not the case. At the next belay we ask if they would be comfortable with us passing them. They decline, and continue on.
Climb then wait is the name of the game, and we can’t do anything but watch the seconds tick by as we wait at the anchor for their party to finish each pitch then follow up directly behind them.
Beautiful diffused late afternoon light makes the fall foliage glow as Brent follows the top pitch of Whitney Gilman
After an hour and a half of cumulative time spent sitting around, we finally reach the top of the climb and glance across the notch at the Franconia Ridge, where we’re headed next. We pack up the gear, and start running downhill, and we’re quickly back in the parking lot and changing into running gear as the sun starts getting lower.
THE PEMI
I devour oatmeal cream pies and chips, and stuff a bagel in my mouth to eat on the start of the run. In less than 20 minutes we’re onto the Falling Waters trail, a steep ascent to the Franconia Ridge. I hope with all my heart we aren’t too late to see sunset on the ridge, but I know inside we are.
We watch the sunset through the trees, and what a glorious sunset it is. But as the light fades, distance and time become abstract concepts. Our only knowledge of the world is the section of path that is illuminated in front of our faces, and time is just the little numbers on the watch that glows when it beeps every mile. We hit the summit of Little Haystack, and throw on some wind layers for the Franconia Ridge. Before long we are over Lincoln, then over Lafayette and headed down into the woods. Things are going relatively quickly, and as we near the bottom of Lafayette before we start climbing Garfield, I think to myself, “if we can keep this pace up we will be Golden!” And then we hit the mud.
The northern half of the Pemigewasset Loop is wet. We are rock-hopping to keep our feet dry, or trudging through sticky mud. Things are going slow. The Pemi is not smooth, fast trails; it’s technical running, made even slower when it’s sopping. We ascend Garfield, and by now it’s around 10PM: our normal bed time.
Brent dons some layers at the top of a ridge on The Pemi Loop
This is always the hard part of every long sufferfest for me. Once I hit this time in the day, my body starts to power down and prepare for sleep mode. I just want a bed, and to not be still on my feet. We’ve been going for 10 hours already; I just want it to be over.
“Why am I doing this? This is so dumb,” I think to myself. I haven’t yet resigned myself to my fate. That will come later.
Neither of us say much to each other as we keep climbing, but within an hour we’ve both seemed to snap out of it and we are powering along, chatting again. I’m trying to keep up with eating around 150 calories per mile. Whenever my watch beeps I pull something out of my pack and start chewing.
We’re soon at one of the AMC huts. It’s around midnight and we grab some water and stop for a quick bite on the steps of the hut. Within a minute we’re shivering from the breeze and the cold so we keep moving. Up South Twin, and the most grueling climb of the whole objective: 1000ft of ascent in a half-mile.
The climb goes relatively quickly for me, but Brent starts voicing his concern that he can’t really eat anything. Nothing is appetizing, and he just can’t force himself to stomach anything. I offer him some pretzels because I brought more than I needed. He takes some and is able to stomach those.
And this is how it goes for the next 3 hours. We walk/run/rock-hop on muddy and wet trails, staring at the ground that’s illuminated by the light on our head and hips, and just try to keep the spirits high. My watch beeps, I eat, then I try to get Brent to eat something too.
I haven’t done a ton of ultras, but I’ve done enough to learn the most important rule: it’s as much of an eating competition as it is a running competition. When your stomach goes, your race will soon be done.
We are so excited when we reach the final summit before descending into Crawford Notch, and the downhill goes quickly, but when we pop out into the notch it’s windy and 35 degrees. I’m still in a t-shirt from all the exertion of running and I am shivering by the time we reach my car we’ve spotted.
So here we are. I’m contemplating quitting again. I wonder why I do these things to myself. Brent’s in the back seat, getting a couple minutes of shut-eye. Maybe he’s not questioning his life choices, and he’s just prepping for the next push up to the Presidential Range. I don’t know. I feel terrible.
But a funny thing happens when you get warm and comfortable again. You forget about the pain you dealt with before. After 10 more minutes (and some caffeine), we’re blasting Welcome to the Jungle and getting AMPED to go out into the pitch black.
THE SOUTHERN PRESIDENTIALS
We head upwards, once again, hoping that the worst is behind us. It’s around 4AM and now that we’re going back uphill we’re quickly warming. We soon see a little bit of light in the trees and we’re so thankful for sunlight. We soon won’t have to be in the dark anymore.
Brent rejoices over our first sight of the sun in many hours
Once the sun is fully up it’s smooth sailing. Spirits are high as we make quick work of the Southern Presidentials. The breeze is calm, the temperature is cool, and the skies are slightly overcast, but there’s not a single other person out there with us. We are tired, but we both know these trails well. It’s both our first time doing the north-bound presidential traverse, so that brings a fun novelty to these familiar sights. We can see Mt. Washington, the highest point we must reach before we start descending for the next section of climbing.
We slowly make our way up and over Mt. Pierce and Mt. Eisenhower. We opt to skip Monroe: at this point if the summit isn’t on the straight line path we don’t care.
We start the slow climb to Washington, grab a selfie with the summit sign, respond to lots of flabbergasted questions from confused tourists who have driven up the mountain, then start descending towards Huntington Ravine for our climb.
We’re so excited to see Michael at the parking lot atop the ravine when we arrive. There are smiles all around as we cram our mouths full of food, refill water bottles, don our climbing outfits, and head down the Huntington Ravine Trail. We’re met with more flabbergasted looks as we head down the trail, as no one can understand why anyone would go down the steep Huntington Ravine Trail.
Brent and Michael chat while we stuff our faces with junk-food and reorganize our gear for the climb
THE PINNACLE
After descending about 1500 feet from the summit of Mt. Washington, we’re nearly at the base of Pinnacle Buttress. I look over and my heart drops. There is already a party on-route and another one just getting to the base of the climb.
We get to the base and start chatting with the two guys there. After a few minutes I cringe and say, “sooooo, here’s what we are doing…” After we recall the adventures of the last 23 hours, I ask very gently if they’d be cool with us passing, and they exclaim “oh my gosh, of course you can go first! We’re just out here for a great day!” I thank them profusely before roping up and starting into one of my favorite alpine climbs.
As I start moving up the low angle rock on the first pitch, I am reminded that I have been moving for the last 23 hours and I got absolutely zero sleep. I’m out of breath and climbing quite slowly, realizing I have to be extra cautious with all my gear placements because I’m so mentally drained. My swollen feet are screaming in pain from being jammed into tight climbing shoes, but we continue on, through the 5.8 crux variation and out onto the beautiful Fairy Tale traverse, one of the most beautiful pitches of climbing in the state.
Brent eyes the crux moves of the 5.8 variation of The Northeast Ridge of the Pinnacle in a sleep-deprived state
We top out, coil the ropes and put the gear away with the help of a friend who had decided to join us for the climb, and hike back to the parking lot to drop our gear. We swap out our climbing gear for trail shoes, don our hydration vests, cram our faces full of any food we can still stomach, and we are off.
THE NORTHERN PRESIDENTIALS
We head back up the Mt. Washington summit cone, and around the side and onto the Northern Presis. We’re basically just fast-walking at this point, with a few short bursts of slowly running on the smooth sections. We pass 18k of vert somewhere past Jefferson and just keep grinding away. No one is around us, and the mountains are eerily quiet for a weekend.
Brent continues to trudge along in the Northern Presidentials as the light starts to drop on us for the second time
I try to keep the energy up but I’ve basically just gone into autopilot. It’s finally come, I’ve just resigned myself to this fate. I will keep mixing up walking and running, forever. There is no existence other than the SuperReverse.
The sun starts to put on a beautiful show, lighting up the north country autumn foliage as we make our way over to tree-line and the beginning of the steep descent to our finish line at the Appalachia trailhead. It’s stunningly beautiful and the low-light gives a warm glow to the orange leaves all around us but it forces me to accept what I’ve been trying to deny for the last 6 miles:
We are going into the dark again.
The last light shines on the NH north-country as we head into dark again
I refuse to turn my headlamp on for the first mile of the steep, wet, and rocky downhill; I keep lying to myself that we will be down in no time. But I’ve done this descent down the Valley Way Trail many times in the dark and I know it’s not the case. It’s not until I slam my quad into a tree downed tree that I couldn’t see in the dark that I finally accept my fate and pull my headlamp out of my pack.
When we first started our descent, I lamented how much I hate descending this trail in the dark.
“It’s not so bad, I really don’t mind it!” Brent had said at the time. Now, more than an hour later, I think he’s rethinking that stance.
We finally land on the smooth trails and pick up the pace. It feels amazing to open the stride up. And then I roll my ankle. I’ve managed to avoid doing it so far so I figure it has to happen once, and I’m not terribly frustrated, until I do it again not 5 minutes later. Now I’m really ready to be done.
A friend is waiting at the trailhead, and when he sees our headlights in the woods he lets out a holler. I hear him and immediately a wave of emotion comes over me. I can’t believe we did this. It feels unreal. I can’t believe this is finally over. I quickly start replaying the whole experience in my mind, but before I know it I’ve popped out into the clearing and we’re done. I feel like I’m going to cry but my body isn’t capable of it; it has given literally all it can.
I give Brent a huge hug and thank him for being a part of this adventure and for being an awesome teammate.
Our friend drives us back to our car at the start, and I put the backseats down and lay down a mattress. I am nearly already asleep as my head hits the pillow.
GRATITUDE
On my drive home the next morning, I replay the 33-hour adventure in my mind and I am overwhelmed with a lot of emotions. I’m tired, I’m sore, I’m content, but most of all I am grateful.
I am grateful for adventure partners like Brent who say yes to things without really knowing what they are getting themselves into. I’m grateful for my body to be able to do these types of adventures without too much complaining. I’m grateful for friends who will show up at crazy hours to support these endeavors. I’m grateful for the numerous climbing and running partners over the years who have helped me build my skills to a point I feel comfortable piecing together an itinerary like this. And most of all I am grateful that I am able to call these mountains home.
Adventures like these are in your backyard, get after them.