Last Annual Vol State Road Race Passes Through Weakley, Carroll County

McKENZIE (July 10-12) — Over three days, residents of Weakley and Carroll County saw over a hundred ultramarathon runners pass through in the early stages of an epic journey spanning the state.
The Last Annual Vol State Road Race is a 500k (314 mile) trek from Dorena Landing, Missouri to Castle Rock, Georgia. The race begins on Thursday morning each year (despite the "last" in the name) with a ferry trip across the Mississippi. When the ferry docks, the runners are off. They have ten days to complete the course. This year, 129 stepped off of the ferry.
Along the way, "road angels" make the trip more tolerable, whether it's a cooler of ice cold water on the side of the road or a veritable oasis such as what McKenzie has offered for the last decade.
For the tenth year, McKenzie's farmers market has become an aid station for weary travelers, stocked with some essentials and temporary comforts such as water, gatorade and pickle juice, light snacks, first aid supplies and cots for sleeping.
Contributing to this year's effort were Al Everett and Chris and Jennifer Nelson.
The quickest of the quick began arriving in McKenzie on Thursday evening, with the bulk of runners passing through on Friday and stragglers (at risk of being paced out of the race) trickling in early Saturday.
Many maintain somewhat normal hours, sleeping at night, but many choose to run more in the cooler nights and sleep and rest during the hottest part of the day.
Although the ranks of the runners include people from all over the world and of all ages (this year ranging from 19 to 87), you'd never know from the scene at the McKenzie aid station. Any combination gathered at a given moment seems like a group of old friends. The same is true for Everett, the Nelsons and other curious locals posted at the farmers market when runners stop to take a break.
A New York City couple making the run together spoke to The Banner about the unique experience.
Jun Lin and his wife Hui Yang arrived in McKenzie Friday morning and stopped for a rest at the farmers market.
Lin is looking for his second Vol State finish in two tries, while Yang is making her race debut. One or both of the couple have competed in other extreme marathons such as HOTS (Last Annual Heart of the South Road Race, another race from Lazarus Lake, creator of Vol State), the Great New York 100 and the New York City Marathon.
Lin said, "Thank you to these amazing angels. We could not do it without them."
Yang expressed her appreciation for the friendly attitudes. "The people are amazing, even the people just driving by. You won't get that in New York," she said with a laugh.
As of Monday morning, lead runner Addison Hendricks was just 30 miles from the finish, Yang and Lin were near the halfway point, and 27 runners had called it quits.