Dale Sanders said he fell 71 times on the trail, but completed the journey as ‘people are motivated … by my efforts’
A 91-year-old hiker has reclaimed his record as the oldest person to complete the more than 2,000-mile Appalachian Trail.
By his count, Dale Sanders, of Tennessee, fell 71 times during the feat, six of which he said were hard falls and one which required a brief hospitalization and another just 200 yards from the end. The 2,193-mile trail runs between Springer Mountain in Georgia and Mount Katahdin in Maine.
The Appalachian Trail Conservancy defines a thru-hike as completing all of the trail’s sections in any order within a year, allowing for pauses. Sanders began his hike on 6 September 2025 in West Virginia and, allowing for some brief breaks, he completed his journey on Monday atop Maine’s highest peak, where he paused to pray at the sign marking the summit.
“I had to thank God, and I had to thank my support team and everybody that got me here,” Sanders, whose trail name is Grey Beard, told the Associated Press.
