By JIM WHITING
For the Review
For much of his adult life, island resident Jeff Phillips contented himself with runs of two to three miles. In recent years, Phillips’ running horizons have expanded considerably. He’s run marathons in Victoria, Paris, Boston, and Washington, D.C.
But it’s his exotic treks that set the 62-year-old apart from his long-distance peers. In 2006, he ran the Great Wall of China Marathon.
The race has numerous steep inclines and declines, and runners must negotiate over 5,100 steps during the five-mile stretch on the wall itself.
The winning time was three hours, 38 minutes and just three other runners broke four hours. Phillips’ five hours and 43 minutes was well in the upper half of the more than 400 finishers.
Last year he ran the Everest Base Camp Marathon. The event begins with a 36-mile trek to the base camp at 17,500 feet. The marathon retraces much of the route, with 10,000 feet of elevation loss and 4,000 feet of gain.
“It’s an absolute killer,” said Phillips, who finished in the exact middle of the 51 entries in a time just over nine hours. “It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And it was the best trip of my life.”
Those two events have whetted Phillips’ appetite for further adventure. He has his eyes on the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro, Peru’s Santa Cruz Trek, the 120-mile Annapurna Circuit in Nepal and the Tour of Mount Blanc, which crosses three European borders.
Phillips, a dentist in the Silverdale Dental Center, grew up in Tacoma and graduated from Stadium High School in 1964. His primary organized sport was wrestling, though he developed a love of climbing as well. The first of his eight summits of Mt. Rainier came while he was still in high school. He also climbed most other major peaks in the Cascades by the time he completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Washington
After dental school, he moved to Bainbridge in 1974 and became “a part-time farmer” in addition to his professional career. For recreation, he ran casually and did some hiking – most notably the 80-mile West Coast Trail on Vancouver Island in 1995.
The catalyst for change came in 2002 after what Phillips terms “a failed marriage.” He began running with the Bainbridge Runners, an informal island organization.
“It is a fabulous, diverse group of friends that have become my usual Sunday social club,” he said. He also enjoys running with his son, Sam.
The following year, he hiked the Chilkoot Trail in Alaska. And in 2004, “After a life-long agreement with myself that I never needed to run a marathon, I ran the Victoria Marathon,” he said. “I was amazed that I accomplished something I never thought I’d do. I had an enormous sense of accomplishment and pride going across the finish line.”
Another step came in 2005 when he joined Island Fitness. “The staff and clients have become an informal family,” Phillips said. “It’s great for cross-training and social distraction while working out and sweating.”
Unlike many marathoners who log year-round mega-miles, Phillips runs just three times a week, for a total of 15-18 miles. He also works out two or three times a week at Island Fitness. His only concession to distance running comes a few weeks before a marathon, when he does several longer runs.
It also helps that he joined fellow Bainbridge runner John Durand, who has run a half-marathon every month for more than four years. Phillips’ own streak, which began in September 2007, reached 16 on Dec. 7 at the Las Vegas Half Marathon.
At 5-9 and just 145 pounds, Phillips is a lean, mean running machine. He often places high in his age division in half-marathons, typically running about an hour and 45 minutes.
“Age doesn’t have anything to do with conditioning,” he said. “I am continually expecting to get faster.”
But running faster is simply a by-product of what has become an optimistic outlook on life.
“I gotta stay tuned up for all the exciting adventures out there,” he said. “And I don’t want to run out of time.”
