It was hard working through that.” But he finished in 46:24 - more than a half-hour ahead of the train.īecause the race starts at Deer Creek Dam, organizers call it the Dam Train Race. Because of a trip to the bathroom, “I started 400 yards behind everyone else. The race winner, Reed Muir of Lindon, accidentally gave the whole field and the train a head start. I had to really speed up over that last half-mile when I saw it was coming.” I feel like I’m going to start crying,” Moreno said as he began to cry with joy and knelt to catch his breath. He crossed the line a second before the train arrived blasting its horn. Skeeter Moreno of Salt Lake City was the last runner to beat the train - just barely. The race started at the Deer Creek Dam, Saturday, August 19, 2017. (Scott Sommerdorf | The Salt Lake Tribune) Runners race toward the finish line near the Soldier Hollow train station as they compete against the Heber Creeper train in a 12k race. “They said to slow down and not race against people, just the train. I did it today.”Ĭrandall finished 17 minutes ahead of the train - 1:01:00 compared to 1:18:38 - so the physical education teacher didn’t actually see much of it after the race began. “Superman got to run like that 35 years ago. He sported a Superman T-shirt and Superman socks to help with the illusion. In my mind, I was doing that the whole way,” said Mat Crandall of Salt Lake City. “In the first Superman movie, he ran side by side against a train. Sure, the train they outran is called the “Heber Creeper” by locals and is known less for blazing speed than for allowing leisurely viewing of pretty mountain scenery.īut runners still had to average faster than 10-minute miles over 12 kilometers (7.45 miles) from Deer Creek Dam to Soldier Hollow to beat that train - gaining 1,022 feet in altitude over the dirt-trail course, with inclines as steep as 18 percent. Superman was “more powerful than a locomotive.” On Saturday, 134 Utah runners proved that they are faster than one.

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