Spotting a runner making their way along an Athens street isn’t uncommon, depending on the neighborhood and time of day. Spotting a group of runners in the middle of a 326-mile journey from Arkansas to Georgia, well — that might be a new one.

And, for a lot of the people participating in the Last Annual Heart of the South race, it’s a new experience for them, too. According to a 2016 blog post by a participant in the Last Annual Vol State race, the title is a reference to the many races in the 1980s that were labeled “First Annual,” with the 314-mile LAVS race taking place each year since 1980.

This year, organizer Gary Cantrell decided to let ultrarunners park their cars in Castle Rock, Georgia, just like they would for LAVS, then board a bus for West Memphis, Arkansas, where they will start the 10-day, 326-mile HOTS race.

They didn’t get to see the course map until they arrived in Arkansas, but Cantrell confirmed Athens will be around the halfway point for participants. They stopped Wednesday at Kreme Delite, where The News Courier was able to speak with Cantrell and a few of the runners.

Diane Durden and Amy Adams were among the group. The women are Marine veterans who knew each other online through the Marines UltraRunners Club of America, but HOTS marked the first time they met in person.

Durden said she’s been running marathons since the mid-2000s, and she’s attempted LAVS before. Adams, though, has managed 100 miles but never attempted anything like LAVS or HOTS.

It’s the “challenge of being self-sufficient on the course and trying to figure things out and problem-solving” that motivates her to take on the journey, Durden said. “It’s an adventure. It’s interesting to see the look on people’s faces when you tell them what you’re doing.”

Seated with them in the grass along South Madison Street were Glenn Kasper and Diane Turner. The four agreed they probably wouldn’t win HOTS, but they were each eager to give it their best.

“It’s like a vacation,” Kasper said. “It really is, to back off and get out of everything.”

“There will be some people running quite a bit of it,” Turner said, a nine-time LAVS participant and a runner since 1982. “They’re going to get it done. They’re going to do 80, 90 miles a day. Some of us are just hoping to eke out that 30 or 40 a day.”

Durden said each ultrarunner will have their own strategy for the race. Most will have a goal number of miles they want to run before they stop, but without knowing the course map, no one is able to plan where they will sleep or eat until the night before the race begins.

“It’s word of mouth,” said Adams, who packed a tarp in case she has to sleep on the ground somewhere along the route.

“Like homeless people, really,” Taylor said.

“The life of a stray dog,” Durden added.

Taylor said if worst comes to worst, most runners at least have a credit card and a cell phone. They can call friends or family members who live along the route, and if they choose to quit HOTS before they finish, there is a van that will travel along the route throughout the race that can pick them up and transport them to their vehicle.

“She may be taking 15 people back the first day,” Taylor said.

“I refuse,” Durden said.

Adams said those who call may have to wait a day or two, depending on where the woman driving is on the route and how much space she has in the van when she gets to them.

“If you’ve got friends within a few hundred miles of you, you can probably find somebody to come get you,” Taylor said. “The first time I dropped, I did. I got someone from Nashville to come and get me.”

In addition to running in HOTS, the four are participating in other running contests and even the virtual Race Across Tennessee. They joked that even if they are back of the pack for HOTS, they’ll probably be at the top of weekly leaderboards and easily add to their total for RAT.

“Since May 1, we’ve been running miles and logging them to get across Tennessee,” Taylor said, “and some are already across and running back now.”

They’re also each in their 40s or older. Durden, at 54, believes it because older generations have learned the persistence, patience, longevity and “stick-it-outness” required for ultramarathons like HOTS. Adams, at 44, was the youngest of the four, while Taylor was the oldest at 63 and Kasper will celebrate his 57th birthday next month.

Why this course

Cantrell attempted the first LAVS race solo in 1980. He said he failed miserably — “I didn’t know what I was doing” — but he was determined to try it again next year.

As word got out, people started approaching him, asking to run the race with him. These days, crowds of well over a hundred gather at the starting line for LAVS, ready to take on the next 314 miles across Tennessee.

Last year, though, Cantrell said he decided to start in West Memphis, Arkansas, for a 330-mile journey that would take participants across rural Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama, passing through several Southern towns — including Athens. There’s even points along the way where they can check out points of interest, like the oldest drugstore in Mississippi, Huntsville’s Tech Town and even Kreme Delite.

“Every journey run is an adventure, and this one has been laid out to provide a surprise around every corner,” reads the HOTS website. “But the biggest surprise is what runners find in themselves along the way.”

Cantrell said the course was originally mapped out as a surprise for DeWayne Satterfield, a Huntsville man widely regarded as an ultrarunning legend. The course would take them through Huntsville and where Satterfield grew up.

Unfortunately, Satterfield got sick, Cantrell said. A tribute post on iRunFar.com said it was an aggressive form of cancer, and the 55-year-old Satterfield died earlier this year.

“So, his family and friends are running a relay along the race,” Cantrell said. “… It was going to be a surprise for him, but now it’s a tribute.”

Satterfield’s widow will run the final leg of the relay, he said.

Visit vacationwithoutacar.com to track race participants as they make their way along the HOTS course and to learn about upcoming races.