P-I Sports Star Award Winner: Ultra-runner Scott Jurek

Scott Jurek took up distance running simply as a way to get in shape for cross-country ski racing.

He grew up in northern Minnesota, and strapping onto skis was simply expected.

Yet, there's been nothing simple about Jurek's run toward history.

Jurek has never stopped running, even when everybody else is content to call it a day.

The Seattle resident has long since left competitive nordic skiing to concentrate on running. Along the way, he has blossomed into one of the world's best ultradistance runners. These are guys who consider marathons at 26.2 miles atuneup.

And at 33, with 13 years of running increasingly longer distances in his wake, he seems to be getting better.

In 2007, he won the Hard- rock Hundred, a 100-mile race in southwest Colorado that is contested at an average elevation of 11,000 feet. Jurek set a course record of 26 hours, 8 minutes.

And he took first-place honors half a world away, becoming the second-fastest runner ever in Greece's Spartathlon. A traditional race from Athens to Sparta, Jurek won for the second year in a row, covering the 246 kilometers (152.9 miles) over elevations that go from sea level to almost 4,000 feet.

"That's the longest I've ever run, and running 153 miles isn't something I'd necessarily want to do, but this is a special event," Jurek said.

The lure of the long-distance road has been strong for Jurek since 1994, when he competed in his first ultra race, a mere 50 miles. He finished second, and since the late 1990s has been among the best in the world.

He won the Western States 100-mile Endurance Run for the first time in 1999, then won it again every year through 2005, at which point he decided seven wins in a succession was enough.

He won the Badwater Ultramarathon in 2005, setting the record, and in 2006. The Badwater is a particularly grueling race starting in California's Death Valley in temperatures up to 130 degrees and ending 135 miles away and more than 11,000 feet higher at Mount Whitney.

SPORTS STAR BANQUET

WHAT: The 73rd annual Seattle P-I Sports Star of the Year awards dinner.

WHEN/WHERE: Tuesday, The Westin Seattle

TICKETS: $75; order by calling 206-448-8066