Section 3
The climb was tough, but not as bad as the last day. We got to run through some meadows and it was a great day - no rain, not to hot or too cold. I was having a great birthday run. I spent a little time at the refreshment stop before heading up to the peak. I made pretty good time climbing up. I was feeling good and decided to try and run down some fairly technical stuff. What was I thinking? It was so much fun dancing over the rocks trying not to fall, then we had a long runnable downhill section. I was excited to make up so much time and have plenty to time to relax, sleep and not worry about cut-offs. Before this thought had even passed I felt a pain in my right knee. Maybe it would pass, I hoped. I stopped and stretched, massaged and tried again, but it didn’t help. I tried walking, that hurt. I tried running faster, that felt OK sometimes. It seemed a slow walk was best so I slowly walked down, with the odd run and break. Again my plan to be done with a section early was not going to happen. I was mad. I had to fix this. I wasn’t going to drop on my birthday. I just took it easy and kept positive thoughts. I hoped it was just a sore muscle and would be better after a little break. Tayna caught up to me and we hiked and ran most of the last part together. The little bump on the elevation chart turned out to be a major climb before the final decent. Eventually we got to a town. Tanya had gone ahead and I saw her outside a pizza place in the town. I was happy to be near the next life station, but no….another TDG surprise. We ran though the town, out of the town and one runner came back saying we had missed the life station. But luckily Roberta, one person crazy enough to run the test run last year and then come back and do it again, caught up and told us we had another three or four kilometres to go up that hill. So we leave the village, enter another village, leave that village. On the way out there was some amazing artwork painted on the massive rock faces that we were running by. I looked a little closer and realised it was just rocks and shadows. I had been going almost three days without sleep and I guess I was starting to see things. Eventually we entered a third village and eventually made it to the third life station. It was really nice to finish a section in daylight, but I needed time to let my knee recover and deal with some serious chaffing. I spent about four hours here again. I tried to sleep and maybe got one hour or less before I gave up and got ready to go again. Around 10:30pm I was back on the trail.
Section 4
It seemed this time we got endless steep giant rock steps to climb. More than half of the North America group had dropped either due to injury or sleep deprivation. I had plenty of great reasons to quit, but nobody had told me to stop yet and that was my rule. The good news was the break had let my knee recover and it was feeling great now.
I had now been going for almost three days with total sleep of maybe 1.5hrs. Things were starting to get interesting in my mind. Eventually Angela caught up with me. We joked about everything being giant at Tor des Geants. I said this was meant for giants, not for regular people like us. I was hoping for another easier section, but no we were back to the tough stuff and life was about to get a whole lot tougher soon. We climbed and climbed. Angela, being an amazing climber, moved ahead of me and soon I was alone for hours and hours of climbing. Here we were coming from the lowest point of the course, climbing 2000metres. You would gain some elevation, drop, then climb again. It was relentless and I was getting really tired. It levelled out a little, but the trail wasn’t clear. In the darkness and my exhausted state I kept getting off the trail. What should have taken a few hours was taking much longer. I couldn’t focus. I wasn’t sure what way to go. I didn’t really know if I was asleep or awake. I needed to sleep, rest or something, but the next rest stop was nowhere to be seen. I kept tripping over rocks, even my feet. I found a rock and laid down. I don’t know for how long. I think it was only a few minutes. I don’t think I really slept just closed my eyes, tried to refocus, regain some energy. After a few minutes some more runners came - a nice French couple, maybe a father and his daughter. I decided it was best to follow them. Listening to them talk and following their lights helped so much. We also entered a very technical area, traversing some rocks that required using ropes. I was pleased I had taken a break and was not alone anymore.
The trail stayed technical, up and down over rocks. After what seemed many more hours and night turned to day for the fourth time I made it to the next refreshment stop. I didn’t fill my water or eat, I just went into the Rifugio, sat at a table, closed my eyes for a few minutes and ordered a hot chocolate.
Hot chocolate in Italy is very different. I had forgotten about that, but remembered when this cup of thick melted chocolate arrived. I ordered some milk to dilute it so it was at least a drink. It was so good - the chocolate, sugar and milk energized me. On my way out I saw a sign saying they had beds… I thought about it - sleep would be a good idea - but decided it would be best to keep going. I filled my water and heading out, now I had chocolate power.
Eventually after more than four hours of sleep-deprived climbing I was going downhill. I even ran a little - the trail was pretty nice for a change. I felt pretty good, but was worried how long the chocolate high would last. After too soon it seemed I was climbing again and felt a hotspot on my foot. I stopped for a bit to tape my toe and sat a little longer for a little break and to prepare myself for the next climb. Again I was climbing then descending down a technical trail. After a while longer I made it to the next refreshment stop where there was some cots setup. I wanted to sleep, but also wanted to keep going and make up some good time. I ate a little and then kept going. I was getting tired again.
We started climbing up again, back to crazy rock fields. It was extremely steep and treacherous. One false step could have been really serious. Where were we going again? Ah yes I was visiting my friend. Why does he live all the way up here? His house must be right around this corner, OK maybe the next corner. This is a stupid place to live. I guess this is what we do for friends...climb stupid mountains… Suddenly I came back to reality, of course I wasn’t visiting a friend. It was my brain sleep-deprived, confused, maybe trying to help me, maybe not. At least I somehow kept moving and got over the mountain.
Now we were going downhill again and things started to look really familiar. I recognized the rock formation - it was crazy insane rock fields again, markers dotted across the landscape, up and down over massive boulders, but I knew it. I felt I’d been here before and it was going to level out soon. I kept going and met up with another runner. He was from Budapest or somewhere. We hiked the rocks (trail doesn’t describe it) together. A hiker came from the other direction said we had one more kilometre to go before the trail got better. After a long kilometre the trail levelled out and I was able to run a little. It all looked very familiar from when was I here before.
We made it to a checkpoint. They didn’t have water, but had some coke. I was getting low on water. Maybe I forgot to fill up at the last point…I couldn’t remember. It was 10km downhill to the next refreshment stop. I knew this hill, OK it was steeper, and it was wet and slippery at parts. My energy was low, I was thirsty and just finished my water. I knew there was some sort of spring a few kilometres down the trail. I remembered I had done this section during UTMB*. I remember I was running with guy who told me about this race. We ran this trail and stopped and got water at the spring. It was going to be OK. At every rock face I looked for the spring - water directly from rocks is drinkable since it is filtered by the rocks. After a while two runners caught up to me as I passed a massive spring. I asked if it was OK to drink and they said yes so I filled my bottle with fresh mountain water. One of the runners was holding marker flag, which I thought that was strange. I kept hiking and enjoying the water. A few minutes later two more runners came up and were pulling the markers. “Shit”, I though. They were the sweeps. I was the last runner… I needed to move. I started to run powered by fear of cut-offs and mountain water. I ran fast, well it felt fast. I ran uphill, downhill, past the guys ahead of me, then the next runners, then more. I pushed hard. I didn’t know how long I had, I just knew the cut-offs must be close and somehow in my sleep-deprived state I had lost hours. I made it to Neil. Now I faced another massive climb and with very little time left. It was about 20km and I had about five hours. That seemed like plenty of time, but this section usually takes six hours. I pushed the pace as hard as I could, passed three or four more runners. Near the top I was literally leaping up rocks, using my poles to push. Then my foot hit a rock at the wrong angle. I tripped and fell, twisting my ankle. It didn’t feel too bad and I didn’t have time for this. I had to keep moving and did. Eventually I caught another runner at the top of the hill and the sun set for another night.
It was hard to follow the markers. The trail was a nice downhill, but it was all uneven dirt. Every step hurt my ankle and I had to move slowly to keep my ankle straight. My light was better than the French guys. He kept calling me to shine my light for him. I would point my light to show the reflective markers and then trip on the trail, sending pain through my ankle.
Racing for a cut-off with a sprained ankle wasn’t good. The good news was I made it up the trail so fast I had a good amount of time to make it down, and didn’t have to run fast. Best of all I knew this trail, I had been here before*. Eventually we made it to the next rest stop. I filled my water and got some food and the French guy seemed relaxed. I decided to head out. I knew there wasn’t much time. They asked me if I was stopping, I said no. They looked at me and said there wasn’t time. I knew there was because there wasn’t a cut-off here. I started to run again. The ankle seemed to hold up and the trail was a little better for a while.
Down a rocky road, across meadows, over a grassy and stone bridge to an endless road of rocks. No vehicle could every drive on this so it was actually a trail. Somehow I hiked and ran this thing for another hour or so before eventually making it to the road. Erin was there waiting to walk me in. I thought I was at the life station, but no, it was a few more kilometres before I would get my break. At least now I knew I was going to make the cut-off although I would have a little less than two hours before needing to head out again. Hopefully I could get a little sleep. I was lucky I knew that last trail section.*
*When I got home I looked at the map for UTMB. I had never run that trail before. It is 100miles from the UTMB course. The whole time my mind was playing tricks on me and I didn’t realize until I was back, a week later writing up this race report notes.
I arrived at Grassoney and accidentally checked out before I checked in giving me minus six seconds in that life station, I was there a little longer. After eating and taking care of other issues I tried to sleep. I did some basic taping on my ankle, checked my feet and an hour had passed. I lay down, closed my eyes and again didn’t sleep. Thirty minutes later I got up and started to get ready to head out back into the night. I didn’t know if the next section would be hard or easy, I just wanted to get this race over and be able to really relax and sleep. I didn’t want to be fighting cut-offs for the next 50 hours. I had covered 200km in about 90 hours and had less than two hours sleep. It was getting harder to focus. I hoped the next section would be easier.
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