Sam Harvey is competing in Big Dog's Backyard Ultra in Tennessee, a gruelling race that has brought together the world's top 75 multi-day runners from 38 different countries.
All Harvey has to do to be declared the winner is outlast his fellow competitors.
Last year Harvey won the Krayzie Midwinter Backyard Ultra, the first time the ‘last man standing’ format had been staged in Christchurch.
The Sumner-based ultra-distance athlete ultimately completed 35 loops of Spencer Park, one more than Queenstown’s Brandon Purdie and Dunedin’s John Bayne.
He qualified for the Big Dog's Backyard Ultra in Tennessee after running in the New Zealand leg of the Backyard Ultra world championships last October.
Harvey completed his first ‘last man standing’ event in Auckland in 2021, though his interest in long-distance running goes back further to his teenage years.
"I played rugby and I did boxing and triathlon. They require running and that’s the thing I’m actually best at so that was my focus," he said last year.
"All roads led back to running.”
