Big Tex Backyard Ultra Course Guide

The yard: 4.167 miles, on the hour, every hour

Here is the whole game. Every hour, on the signal, everyone starts the 4.167 mile loop together. You have 60 minutes to finish it and be back in the starting corral for the next hourly start. Run it in 50 minutes and you get 10 minutes to sit, eat, and deal with your feet. Run it in 58 and you get almost nothing before turning around and doing it again. Twenty-four of these is 100 miles in a day, and a strong field usually pushes well past that.

The smart move is to run each yard at a relaxed, repeatable effort and bank rest in the corral, not speed on the loop. There is no reward for finishing faster beyond a few extra minutes to sit, so the runners who last treat the loop as a chore to execute efficiently and protect every spare minute between laps.

New for 2026: Last Rucker Standing and the Lil Tex Kids run

Big Tex adds a Last Rucker Standing division in 2026, following the exact same hourly format on a shorter loop, with standard backyard ruck weight rules (20 lb under 150 lbs, 30 lb over 150 lbs, no specific brand or pack style required). There is also a free Lil Tex Kids run on a roughly 1 kilometer trail loop that kicks off right after the noon lap starts, a nice touch if you are bringing family to watch.

The corral cutoff and self-supported aid

There is exactly one rule that matters, and it is unforgiving. Be in the starting corral when the hour turns over, ready to go, or you are eliminated, no appeal. Once you are on the course, you are on your own: no aid from crew, no pacers, no leaving the course except for the bathroom. TROT staffs one fully stocked aid station at the start/finish, and runners are encouraged to set up their own personal support area around it for the between-yard stretch.

Pick a loop pace you can repeat half-asleep

The target is a loop time that leaves you real rest every hour without ever feeling hard. On a mostly flat, crushed-gravel loop like this one, that might mean a comfortable 45 to 50 minutes per 4.167 mile yard early, banking 10 to 15 minutes of corral time. Use a grade-adjusted pace to translate that into an honest effort level, because minimal elevation change does not mean effortless: it means the pace that matters is the one you can hold at 3 AM on day two, not the one that feels easy on yard one.

Know what a day actually costs you

Even without a finish line, plan in chunks: get to 24 yards (a 100 mile day), then reset and go again. Use a race-time prediction off your real fitness to sanity-check what holding a given loop pace for a full day does to you, so you go in with a realistic picture of when sleep and fueling, not your legs, become the limiter.

Eat every single lap, even when you do not want to

Because the laps are short and the effort stays easy, your stomach handles real food here better than in a flat-out race, and you should use that. Aim for a steady stream of carbohydrate every hour, often in the 150 to 300 calorie range per yard depending on your size, mixing real food with gels and drink mix. The danger is a slow drift into a calorie hole over many hours, so eat on schedule from the first lap, before you feel like you need it. Early November in San Felipe usually runs mild to cool, which helps keep sweat losses manageable, but still take electrolytes every lap and drink to thirst.

The mental game is the actual race

This is where Big Tex is truly won. The format is a slow grind designed to test your will, not your legs, and the low points usually hit hardest in the overnight hours. The trick is to never make a quit decision while you are low: finish the yard, sit down, eat something, deal with your feet, and tell yourself you only have to do one more lap. Sleep is the wild card, some runners nap briefly in the corral on fast laps, others ride it out without sleeping at all. Figure out your own approach in training, and protect your feet obsessively.