Do you know about the #fkt phenomenon?
FKTs or FastestKnownTimes to give them their full name have been in existence for as long as someone has ever tried to be the fastest to run a route.
What is more of a modern thing is that a few Americans put together a website www.fastestknowntime.com and in the pandemic when races weren't being hosted many of the best runners around the world had a go at beating or trying to set a new FKT for one of the many iconic routes around the world.
Our very own Coach - David Bone is currently third on the all-time world list for the most of FKTs held - https://fastestknowntime.com/athletes
Now let's be very clear about this. It is perfectly fine for you (try at least) to submit a route that is not on their website and if they do and you are the first to run it then you have an fkt (what is known to many as a 'first known time' - it's just that both have the same #fkt) So during the pandemic David went deep into the history of the London trails and added many that weren't previously of this (US focused) site.
One of the outputs of all these FKTs has been a profound passion for the many routes that exist in London and how possible it is to start piecing different ones together to make a new long route.
When Camino created the Greenways challenge - some of the routes used were a homage to these historical routes. What Camino did was to modify them so that they were easier to get to and from using public transport and also to take advantage of seeing plenty of London's iconic buildings/statues and weird stuff!. During the Greenways we didn't actually do many of these actual FKTs but in the Blueways challenge we will do a couple. So if you fancy doing an FKT route (and maybe with a bit of pacing from the Camino Coaches we can advise whether it is actually possible to run the fastest version of the Mixed Team category - where you need both women and men in your group to beat the previous best Mixed Team time)
Ideas on how you can get the most out of the www.fastestknowntime.com website:
One of things that we love is their ROUTES section - Click on the global map and zoom in until you find the area that you live in (or where you might be visiting) - London must have somewhere between 40-50 routes and even more when you include 200-500 mile routes that carve a way through our city before ending in every other place imaginable.
Blue Ribband FKTs:
There have been quite a few podcasts/ blogs and now films made about a few of the routes around the world which are seen as the most iconic routes (it's especially true that the world's best runners keep coming back to claim the FKT crown). These include:
Pennine Way (UK) - 268 Miles - John Kelly - 2 days 10 hours
Appalachian Trail (US) - 2189 Miles - Karel Sabbe - 41 Days 7 hours
Pacific Coast (US) - 2592 Miles - Timothy Olson - 51 Days
Bob Graham Round (UK) 66 Miles - Jack Kuenzle - 12 Hours 23 mins
In London we have one which has seen the most attempts by some of the capitals best runners - Capital Ring - 75 mile loop around London - Record is currently 10 hours 14 minutes. What would it take to break the 10 hour mark??
FKT resources:
Check out the podcast David did with Founder Buzz Burrell where they discuss the specific differences between the FKTs in UK vs USA and also some of the quirks about things 'this side of the pond' - you can clearly hear some of the seeds of the Camino Blueways Project in this episode
Some of the previous FKT successes and failures from Camino Coaches are in our Blogs - just look for the #fkt #fastestknowntime links
Summit Fever are a UK based film production company that have made some of the most iconic films of recent attempts - on of our favourites is the battle between John Kelly and Damian Hall to see who could break the Pennine Way FKT
If you have any questions about Fastest Known Times or are interested in getting your name added as an FKT record holder then drop Camino a message on all the normal channels.