The Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc lottery is done. If you got in, Congrats! If you did not, there are some great (maybe more fun) opportunities in the Alps for you.
In 2016, 2555 runners started the UTMB and 1468 finished (http://utmb.livetrail.net/stats.php). Over the course of 105 rugged miles there are unforeseeable events and challenges, but with a little more information I think more runners can finish the UTMB and swing these stats in the right direction.
There are 1000’s of articles written on how to get ready for your big race. There is a mass of valuable information on how to eat, how to train, how to recover and what gear you will need. These are very valuable topics, but there is very little dedicated to dealing with the time everything falls apart, and at some point, at some race, it will.
I have been racing ultra marathons for four and a half years now. Up until very recently my life was somewhat uni-dimensional. I raced often, trained more often, and the majority of my waking moments were spent in the pursuit of endurance goals. I ate, slept and breathed my sport, the mountains, and far fetched ideas. And while those things are all still true to some extent, a major life change has taken me and my new growing family by storm this past month. My wife had our son, Laiken Col Ghelfi, on August 30, 2016. It was just 10 days before the running of the 7th annual Pine to Palm 100 mile endurance run.
Mile 106: I’m pretty sleepy, sitting in a metal chair in the doping control office, cotton ball taped to my arm, losing my ability to focus, the smell of blood mixed with alcohol wipes is overwhelming, every sound is amplified to a roar, I mutter something about needing a garbage can, I’m gonna throw up all over the floor. I already feel bad because I know my odor is less than ideal and I can’t focus enough to answer the officials basic health questions. Everything gets uncontrollably loud and immediately peaceful. I wake up on the floor and have no idea where I am, someone is asking me questions and talking hurriedly into a cell phone, I don’t bother to answer. I put my head back down and immediately go to sleep.
We are writing this as we drive across the desert of the American West. We are very tired, as we just raced 6 times in 6 days. 4 hours of interrupted Motel 6 sleep didn’t really do the trick. We just won the Transrockies stage race in Colorado. For the team competition you have to stay with your partner the whole time and each run the entire course. The winners are crowned by their cumulative time for all 6 stages
Mount Shasta is a peak that dominates the landscape of an entire region. From the central valley California to Southern Oregon views of Mount Shasta’s summit are unavoidable. It is freakin’ massive! The peak stands 10,000 feet above the valley below and over 5,000 feet higher than any other mountain in the vicinity. As a young kid growing up in Redding 60 miles to the south I had a deep desire to climb this mountain. “But it is too dangerous” is what my parents told me. So I never got to climb in my youth, I could only look on in awe from the slopes below. If any mountain has a mystic pull this is one of them.
“For a lot of collegiate athletes, the end of the eligibility clock represents an unspeakable evil, the sudden snatching away of the thing that for four to five years has provided their life shape, meaning, and a tight group of friends. For me, although I’d cut off one of my toes for another cross season, it feels more like opportunity. In school and work, I have more control of my schedule. In life in general, I have more time. And athletically, I can train however and as much as I want.” – Eric Ghelfi
