Mt. Washington Road Race

Annually one of the most grueling races of the year in the U.S., the 7.6-mile run up New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington (6,288 feet with an average incline of 12 percent) tests runners legs, lungs and their resolve to the extreme. Joe Gray of Colorado Springs won the race for the second consecutive time, recording a new American record on the course with a sizzling 58-minute, 15-second clocking. Andy Wacker finished a strong but distant second in 1:00:59 and continued the Colorado blitzkrieg up the mountain as six of the first seven finishers hailed from the Centennial State. On the women’s side, the top three runners were also from Colorado, with Kim Dobson (1:11:39) outrunning Brandy Erholtz (1:15:34) for the victory. But the most applauded effort of the day went to 95-year-old George Etzweiler of State College, Pa., who slowly but surely reached the top of the mountain in 3:28:41. Scroll through the stunning images from Joe Viger below to get a glimpse of how the race played out.