Loop 13: all three still standing, 49:35 from bib 11

Loop 13 is in: all three runners still in the race came back inside the hour, and thirteen yards is 87.2 km, or 54.2 miles. Night is on the course.

Bib 11 was quickest, in 49:35, with 10 min 25 sec to spare. Bib 18 followed in 51:54 and bib 17 in 54:07, who had 5 min 53 sec to spare. No one went out in loop 13, so 43 are out and three are in the race, all on 13 yards: bibs 11, 17 and 18.

What the splits say. All three slowed. Bib 11 gave back 3 min 41 sec on loop 12, and 49:35 is his slowest loop since loop 1. He has now run 10 hours 8 minutes of the 13, averaging 46:48 a loop, about 13 minutes of rest an hour; his last five still average 46:40 against 47:35 for his first five. Bib 18 was 2 min 41 sec slower than his quickest loop of the race, the 49:13 in loop 12, and his last five average 50:34 against 52:06 for his first five. He has run 11 hours 10 minutes, about an hour more than bib 11. Bib 17’s 54:07 is the slowest loop he has run, and his last three have each been slower than the one before: 52:25, 53:27, 54:07. His first five loops averaged 47:27 and his last five 52:18, so over the last five he is giving bib 11 about five and a half minutes a loop.

The context. This is a last-one-standing race with no finish line: it ends when one runner is left, and the winner has to complete one more yard than the last runner to stop. The Ahmedabad chapter record is 18 yards, set by Amit Bhattacharjee in 2025, so the three left are 5 yards short of it. Yard 24 is 100 miles, 11 yards away. The best of this season so far is 25 yards, at Pune. Together the whole field has run 347 yards, 2,327 km.