Resident runs Every D*** Street in town

FALLBROOK – Many local residents may have seen the same guy running on their street over the last two months. In fact, he has run on every street in Fallbrook.

James Blackwell is a social worker who recently moved to Fallbrook with his family. Blackwell is an ultrarunner. Technically, ultrarunning is any competition longer than a marathon (26.2 miles) but most ultrarunners run between 31 and 63 miles (50km to 100km) at a time.

In August 2018, James ran the Kodiak Ultramarathon in Big Bear, 100 miles in 35 hours, and proposed to his girlfriend, Frances Jones, at the finish line.

With the pandemic and social distancing guidelines, 2020 has been a difficult year for organized ultrarunning competitions. However, there are many online challenges. The one Blackwell recently completed is called "Every Damn Street," which was organized by Aravaipa Running. In this event, athletes were challenged to run every single street in a city or town. He chose Fallbrook to meet the challenge.

Since moving to Fallbrook, Blackwell enjoys running at Monserate Mountain, De Luz, and Los Jilgueros Preserve. His upcoming challenges include "Run One'' where he will run the complete length of De Luz from Fallbrook to Temecula. He is also planning on "Everesting" Palomar Mountain, which means scaling the mountain continuously until he has reached the altitude gain of Mount Everest (29,032 feet).

Fallbrook has just under 1,000 streets and Blackwell has covered every block of every one of them. To complete this, he ran 258.53 miles, and climbed 49,019 feet of elevation. His wife, Frances, was born and grew up in Fallbrook, and says James has seen more Fallbrook streets than she has! When asked which street was his favorite, he replied, "The last one."

Submitted by MaryAnne Jones.