So we finally know when the Barkley Marathons is taking place this year and the big question now is what weather is in store for the 40 runners at Frozen Head State Park in rural East Tennessee?
It literally can make or break the chances of anyone finishing the tortuous five loops within the allotted 60 hours.
There may have been a record five finishers last year – including the first woman in Jasmin Paris – but it could all have been so different.
Fine margins
In 2024 the weather was good pretty much throughout but race creator Laz Lake revealed afterwards: “We were all reminded of just how narrow the margins are at Barkley.
“When the rain began an hour after the race ended we broke camp and loaded everything up in progressively harder rain.
“The drive home was made in a downpour. Had that arrived one day earlier we would have been lucky to see one finisher.”
So onto 2025 and it has to be said there was lots of gnarly and very windy weather over last weekend.
Up in the air…
But things have settled down, for now.
After announcing that the conch had been blown to signal an hour to the start, Keith Dunn – who is the only source of official updates – also posted a weather update: “Weather: “It was cold last night, very clear. Right now sunny and warming up. It is supposed to get into the high 60s/low 70s today. Tonight will not be as cold as last night. Rain is not expected until tomorrow evening.”
And looking in more detail, the temperatures for Tuesday and Wednesday even up in the mountains are expected to be around 12 degrees Celsius, with minimal chill factor at night. Lower down they are around five degrees warmer.
But on Wednesday those strong winds – with gusts potentially up to 65 mph at the highest points – are poised to return.
And to make matters worse late on Wednesday and going into Thursday, when those still running will potentially be onto their fourth and fifth loops, there is rain forecast and the temperatures suddenly plummet by nearly 15 degrees at all levels.
Up high the wind chill factor is set to be around -10 though things improve markedly across the board so Thursday really does look the pivotal day for any number of reasons.
That’s according to a variety of sources including mountain-forecast.com, Accuweather and the Weather Channel.
And in terms of the daylight hours, we’re pretty much close to the Spring Equinox – in fact, it’s this Thursday. So on Wednesday at Frozen Head State Park the sun rises at 07:42 local time and sets at 19:49.
