Durango 2027 · planning sheet
The Run Sheet
What race day actually asks of a team: the order the legs run in, when each one opens and closes, how long you may take on it, and how long the whole day has really taken the teams who have done it.
Two kinds of number appear below and they are always labelled. Finishes actually recorded at previous races, and a schedule modelled from them. Nothing here is guessed, and nothing here is a rule until the Race Bible says so.
The chain
Seven legs, 9 racer positions. The timing bracelet is handed forward at each exchange. Two legs can carry two racers: the river paddle runs a tandem kayak, and the road run splits into two segments which one racer may cover alone or two may share. A single racer on the road run has the whole leg limit, not half of it.
This is the order set in the Race Bible, confirmed by the race organisers on 23 September 2026. The Bible still marks it provisional pending the timing vendor and the water-safety lead. Read the rule at the Race Bible.
When each leg is open
Your time limit is how long you personally may take on your leg. Go over it and your team's day ends there, because this is a race. It is measured from the moment you are handed the bracelet, it is set separately for the Full and Sprint courses, and it does not change with how early or late you start. Each leg opens on a set mark placed within a few minutes of the earliest a racer could possibly reach it. The last column is not a second deadline: it is simply when a leg empties if every racer on it uses their whole limit, rounded up to the hour.
| Leg | Opens | Estimated best time · Sprint | Time limit · Full | Time limit · Sprint | Leg clears by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TRL Trail Run | 6am | 1h | 1h 55m | 1h 45m | 8am |
| MTB Mountain Bike | 7am | 59m | 2h 37m | 1h 58m | 11am |
| SUP Stand-Up Paddle | 9am | 27m | 1h 22m | 57m | 1pm |
| SWM Open-Water Swim | 9:30am | 16m | 54m | 30m | 2pm |
| RCY Road Cycle | 8:45am | 1h 32m | 3h 10m | 2h 43m | 3pm |
| PAD River Paddle | 10:15am | 50m | 1h 35m | 1h 35m | 4pm |
| RDR Road Run | 11am | 49m | 2h 58m (1h 29m each if two share it) | 1h 36m (48m each if two share it) | 7pm |
| Whole day | — | 6h 08m | 12h 50m | 11h 39m | 7pm |
The Full limits, checked
The Full limits total 12h 50m, with the road cycle run alongside the paddle and swim rather than after them. The slowest Full team ever recorded finished in 14h 18m, in 2023 — so these limits sit inside the worst real day, and a team repeating it would not finish within them. That field may not have raced today's structure, so the comparison is not clean. Nothing here binds a racer yet.
The Sprint limits, checked
The seven Sprint limits total 11h 39m against a slowest Sprint team of 10h 52m. Sprint gets its own set for a reason: hold it to the Full limits and no Sprint team in our history would ever have been stopped.
The tail finishes in daylight
From a 6am start the last leg closes at 7pm, and workable light on race day ends about 7:41pm. Running the road cycle alongside the lake legs pulled the whole chain in; modelled end to end it finished after dark.
This is a planning model, not the rule. It is drawn from a 6am start because the real start time is not set, and from previously published leg distances plus the race directors' measured 2027 draft routes, none of which is confirmed. The Race Bible sets the cutoffs that actually bind a racer, and it has not set them yet. On the Full course the road cycle runs at the same time as the paddleboard and the swim; on the Sprint the legs run one after another. The hand-offs are set out on the exchange zones page.
How long the day takes
Measured from the three Durango editions, the course raced today. The bar shows the middle half of all finishing teams, the line inside it the typical team, and the ends the fastest and slowest teams recorded.
It has got faster every year
The same course, three editions. Both the winning time and the typical time have come down each year, and the field has grown.
| Edition | Full: fastest | Full: typical | Full: teams | Sprint: fastest | Sprint: typical | Sprint: teams |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 9h 25m | 12h 46m | 18 | 6h 44m | 8h 16m | 13 |
| 2024 | 8h 28m | 11h 14m | 21 | 7h 31m | 8h 35m | 7 |
| 2025 | 7h 28m | 9h 21m | 27 | 5h 47m | 7h 05m | 14 |
Solo Ultra Heptathlon, where one athlete covers every leg: 2023 8h 37m and 14h 18m · 2025 9h 21m.
Plan your roster
A team may enter with anywhere from one to nine racers and cover the 9 positions however it chooses. Fewer racers means doubling up, and that is a strategy rather than a penalty.
| Racers you bring | Positions each racer covers | What it means on the day |
|---|---|---|
| 9 | One each | Nobody races twice. The most rest, the most people to coordinate. |
| 7 | Most take one, two take two | The usual shape. The doubled racers are normally on the paddle or the road run. |
| 5 | Two each, one takes one | Common for a tight group. Expect two hard efforts per racer. |
| 3 | Three each | Serious day. Pace it like a long training block, not a race. |
| 2 | Four and five | Close to the solo experience, shared. |
Wingmates are unlimited, registered, and are not counted in the 9. Minimum ages are set per leg and are on the registration page.
What is not set yet
Four things decide whether the schedule above becomes the real one. One is now set and three are open. Each names the person who settles it, so you can see what the page is waiting on rather than guessing.
Start time
The schedule above assumes a 6am gun. The real one waits on the permit.
operationsCutoff times
The chain above models them. None of it binds a racer until it is approved.
race directorLeg distances
The 2025 distances are on the course maps page; three legs carry the race directors' 2027 draft routes so far, and the rest are measured leg by leg.
course reconLeg order
Set: trail run, mountain bike, paddleboard, swim, road cycle, river paddle, road run - confirmed by the race organisers on 23 September 2026. The Race Bible still carries its provisional mark until its next revision.
race directorNo edition of this race has ever recorded a leg split. Every per-leg limit above is therefore modelled rather than measured, and the whole-day figures are the check on it — a check they no longer all pass. The Full limits total 12h 50m against a slowest Full team of 14h 18m, so a team repeating that day would now miss them, though that 2023 field may not have raced today's structure. The Sprint limits total 11h 39m against a slowest Sprint team of 10h 52m, which still sits outside. The estimated best times total 6h 08m against a fastest Sprint team of 5h 47m — a real team has already beaten the model's fastest possible day. Those gaps are the reason this is a model and not a rule. When the course is measured and the cutoffs are approved, real numbers replace it and this page says so.
Whole-day finish times are taken from the published results of the 2023, 2024 and 2025 Durango editions, the same records served on the results pages, timed by Brooksee and Laurel Timing; teams that did not finish are excluded from every figure. The per-leg schedule is modelled from previously published leg distances and the race directors' measured 2027 draft routes, at paces appropriate to 6,500 feet, and checked against those same results. The racer positions and the leg order come from the Race Bible. Leg distances are on the course maps page.