Denise McHale smashed the past road relay's ultra record by nearly 20 minutes on Saturday.

The Whitehorse resident clocked in at a whopping 5:28.00 from Carcross to Rotary Peace Park – totaling 72 kilometres – in the Klondike Trail of '98 International Road Relay.

Keith Thaxter set the last record with a time of 5:45.13 in 2009, but placed second this year with a time of 5:52.00. Whit Aillaud rounded out the ultra category with a time of 7:43.00.

This year marked McHale's first attempt at the ultra.

But she has a knack for showing up at big competitions – this year's road relay was sandwiched between two longer races.

"It's a training run for me, for a 100-km race at the world championships in seven weeks.

"This is just a great training run and a good confidence builder,” McHale said.

She placed third – tops for Canadian women – in the 10th annual Canadian Death Race, a 125-km race held in Grande Cache, Alta., last month.

That race and the road relay are both training blocks for the IAU 100-Km World Championships in Gibraltar, Spain, this November.

"It's always good to have the motivation of a race,” she said.

"Leg seven and eight just flew by in no time, and then halfway through nine you start thinking, ‘Things are starting to get a little tired, a little stiff,' and then that last leg always kind of drags, so I was pretty happy to see the finish line,” said McHale, who is the current Canadian 100-kilometre women's champion.

"Actually all I was thinking was, ‘Suck it up because I'm going to have 28 more km to run the next time.'”

Her training schedule for such a race is fairly typical, she said.

"I run at lunch everyday, speed work, and then long runs on the weekend. I mostly do trail running, so I tried to switch because the 100-km world championships are on the road.”

She and Thaxter ran the first two legs together before McHale pulled away.

The two train together a lot, she said, adding, "It's a friendly rivalry.”