Phil Gore’s Project 168 (7 days of running)

Current Backyard Ultra (BYU) world champion Phil Gore, with 119 loops at Australia’s Dead Cow Gully race in June 2025, will attempt to run 168 loops in seven straight days on Sunday 23 August.

Gore aims to set an unofficial BYU record, as this charity event follows a unique format; he is running it solo, with no assist.

Why is it called Project 168?

Gore has titled this challenege Project 168, as this will amount to the number of loops, or hours, that mark out exactly one week, Sunday to Sunday. From August 23 to 30, he will run one 6.71 km loop (4.16 miles) every hour, on the hour, for seven straight days at Alfred Skeet Reserve in Forrestdale, Western Australia. The full distance of 168 laps covers exactly 700 miles (1,127 km).

Speaking on the Dose of Benny podcast, Gore said:

“It is a little bit daunting, like I have set myself a massive goal, another two days more than what I have done before. It is a believable goal [and] I do believe I can achieve it. At the end of the day, we don’t know if I’ll get there or not, but either way I’m going to find out a lot about myself”.

Speaking on why he is doing this challenge, he said: “most of the time I have been the last one standing, which means I haven’t found out what that limit is, so with Project 168 I just remove that factor of having other competitors, having an assist and it’s just about myself and seeing how far I can go.”

The countdown is on for Gore, with tens of thousands of people set to tune in over the next week. Follow the run on the Project 168 website.