Racing around Mont Blanc, again

Made it! At the finish with my super-crew, Marietta

Five minutes after finishing the UTMB back in 2018, I had a slightly mad thought. “I’d rather chop my own hand off than ever do that again,” I thought. I told myself to remember the thought, in case I ever started thinking about doing it again.

Within a few moments, the thought had softened a little. Maybe just a finger, I thought. A few weeks later I was looking back on the race with some fondness, and thinking, maybe next time I’ll do the CCC, the UTMB's shorter sister race. One hundred kilometres in those mountains - that’s a huge, epic challenge, but without the insanity of two nights without sleep.

And so on Friday morning, I stood on the start line of the CCC in Courmayeur in Italy, the mountains hulking ominously all around us, the jagged tops appearing out of the dark, gathering clouds. Storms were forecast. Better than hot sun all day, I thought. I felt slightly scared, but also excited. Nervous, but thrilled to be here again, among this melee of lithe, chiselled, tough men and women and backpacks and cow bells and cheers and the buzz of the long road ahead.

I really didn’t know what to expect. My training, as I’ve been recounting on here for weeks, has been sporadic and fairly minimal. Would my legs hold out? Would I crash and burn out there?

I was forced to start slowly as we started up a narrow trail, up a mountain in single file at a steady hike. After about an hour and half we came through some trees, cresting a ridge. This must be the top, I thought. But we emerged over the edge to see the trail rising up into the sky ahead, with a snake of runners going all the way to the top.

“Putain,” said the French runner behind me, looking up at the runners, like a trail of ants on the mountain.

After another hour of climbing, we finally reached the top and started descending. I let myself flow. I wasn’t trying to push it, or worrying about my position, but I started overtaking runners, one after the other.

Was this stupid, I wondered. But going slower wasn’t any easier. It felt better just to flow with the slope.

The entire race was like that. I just let the shape of the Earth beneath me dictate my pace. The steep climbs I took at my steady, mule-like pace, and then I’d roll down the descents. It felt good to simply follow the contours of the land, and I fell into a rhythm that stayed strong until way into the race.

Somehow I was faster than almost everyone around me on the descents, skipping past people who were mostly stuttering and stumbling, or tottering carefully. “Merci,” I’d say again and again, a little embarrassed, as they stepped aside to let me by, hearing my footsteps pattering up behind them.

At each checkpoint throughout the race I was a little further up the field than before, which was a satisfying way to run the race. All the way to the end I gained places, even finishing with a slightly comical sprint past three runners, punching the air, smiling, happy to be back in Chamonix in under 20 hours.

It was past 4 o’clock in the morning by the time I finished, so I didn’t get the epic cheers I experienced finishing the UTMB in the mid-afternoon. But it was a joyful feeling nonetheless. I’d done it without any crisis, without any depths of despair. I was finally getting the hang of these ultras.

It was probably better, I thought afterwards, that I wrote my book as a novice ultra runner, since this maintaining your composure and keeping the pace steady was not such a crazy story.

I don’t want to give the wrong impression; it wasn’t easy. Each climb and descent always went on way longer than I felt I could bear. I’d start off up or down feeling fine, feeling happy to be going the other way again, settling into my rhythm - slow and steady on the ups, and quick rolling, quick feet, skipping and bouncing as Joe Kelly taught me on the downs. But by about two thirds of the way up, or down, I’d start feeling like this was going on too long. Surely we must be at the top (or the bottom) by now? But it would go on. And on. And on.

The worst was in the night. I’d feel like I must be near the top of a climb, but then I’d look up and see head torches in the dark way up above me. Surely not? Were we really going all the way up there? Were those lights even head torches, or were they stars? Sometimes, luckily, they were stars. Sometimes they were head torches. Don’t look up, I told myself. Just keep moving. You’ll get there. One step at a time. It can’t go on forever.

At times I’d find myself in a mini train of runners, all hiking in silence up the mountain, the only sound the crunch of our feet on the trail, and the click clicking of poles on the rocks. Occasionally someone somewhere would let out a howl of despair. Everyone else would just keep walking, not responding. It was like some unearthly death march. Occasionally we’d pass someone sitting with their head in the hands, or standing hunched over their poles in exhaustion. The rest of us would just keep moving on by, not speaking.

That’s what you had to do. Just stay in the moment. Keep moving. Don’t give in to the ripples of despair, the thoughts telling you that you can't take any more. That’s when you’re done. I’ve been there, sitting slumped by the trail, wondering how these other people were still moving. This time I was one of those still moving. This is what people mean when they say ultra running is all in the mind. At this point, whether you keep moving or whether you sink into crisis is just a matter of keeping strong in your mind. Not thinking ahead. Not letting the waves of negativity pick you up and wash you away.

I managed it every time. Even up the torturous last climb that finally gave way to a brutal rocky traverse that was like something dreamt up by some maniacal, masochist course designer. So many times on that final traverse I nearly fell on the rocks, my tired legs sliding and stumbling. What was this madness? But no one passed me. Everyone else was struggling.

But we made it. Back into Chamonix, back to the comfort of a hotel, a hot shower, the end of the journey. The mountain trails just a memory now. But a vivd, wild, exciting memory of leaping and climbing and people cheering, and dancing in isolated cabins, and buzzing aid stations, and exhaustion and those epic, supersized landscapes. For all the hype that goes with UTMB week, it’s a wonderful, special experience to run one of these races. I'm glad I came back.

***

The next day it was emotional sitting watching the last finishers of my race stumbling through the streets of Chamonix. I loved clapping and cheering on each one, looking at their faces and feeling their joy at finally reaching the hallowed finishing section.

Hot on their heels came the first UTMB runners. This report has gone on too long already for me to comment too much on the elite races, but first home was the legend himself, Killian Jornet, having run 105 miles in under 20 hours, up and down those mountains (a new course record). My head still can’t fathom how that is possible. I’d watched him on the live feed back in the hotel skipping over that final nightmarish traverse like a kid in a playground, eating it up for breakfast.

That evening, as we headed out for dinner, I thought of the majority of the UTMB runners at that moment heading into their second night out on the mountain. They still had those big final climbs to come. Their minds were about to get scrambled. Did I envy them at all? Not a chance. In fact, the thought of that final climb after 35 hours running in your legs - instead of 15 hours - made me shudder. No, the CCC was enough madness for me. For now!