How so many amateur runners snatched their “Grail” after more than 40 hours of racing

From our special correspondent in Chamonix,

Courtney Dauwalter and François D’Haene have been enjoying their success on the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc for more than 24 hours. This Sunday afternoon, a whole other race concludes in the city center of Chamonix. Yet it is indeed the UTMB, launched Friday between 5 and 6 p.m. with 171 km and 10,000 m of elevation gain. “You need François D’Haene but you also need lambdas runners,” smiles Loïc Libot (44). Between the qualifying points and the draw, some of us have been waiting for three years to be here, we train like animals, and the time barriers do not leave us time to dip our hands in a stream . “

Among the 2,300 participants of the biggest ultra-trail event in the world, some have a stopwatch in their heads fixed on a timing, 46:30, the maximum time allowed to become a finisher, i.e. before 4:30 p.m. this Sunday. “I know the 14 intermediate time barriers almost by heart, confided before the race Olivier Mevel (57 years old), from Perpignan. I often can’t even afford to stop at the pit stops. “

“Yesterday, I wondered what I was doing there”

This Sunday morning, in Trient (Switzerland), the penultimate ravito located at km 140, dozens of runners in galley took advantage of the heat to the end (8 hours) alongside their loved ones. The difference is funny there between the soundtrack linking the Village People and Franckie Vincent and these amateur sportsmen with bruised bodies offering themselves a quarter of an hour of nap on benches or tables, while others change their dressings to bulbs. At 39, Antoine Wormser is trying to courageously complete his first UTMB: “Yesterday, around 5 pm, I wondered what I was doing there. But once I got into my second night, I wasn’t going to wake everyone up to be picked up in Italy or Switzerland. No, I’m not going to give up now, only 30 km from the end. “

He will hold on, crossing the line after 45:29 of a fascinating surpassing himself. As two songs sound more in tone, You’ll never walk alone and Take me, we meet at 7.15am with Luidgi Le Bars. This 53-year-old salesman from Dunkirk says he started trail running in 2010, just after the death of his father. His journey to ultra has always had a cathartic dimension.

“I wonder what’s going through their minds”

“In 2010, I signed up for a 42 km race and took my daddy’s ashes with me on the race,” he says. There, I participate in the Grail of trail runners and I always carry his ashes in my bag. Sometimes when the circumstances of life are complicated, we imagine a story where everything aligns well. I repeat to my children that you have to believe in your dreams and it is a dream to share this adventure with them. At his side, Antoine and Juliette, respectively STAPS student and nurse, have red eyes. Since Friday, they have been following him closely by bus and van. Juliette (26) summarizes the state of mind of the family.

It’s stressful for us but we are proud of our dad. When I see some runners staggering and not really being aware of much, I wonder what is going through their heads… ”

A festive atmosphere worthy of the Tour de France on Friday evening

Essentially this famous “surpassing oneself” so hard to understand for those who do not practice ultra. Like his companion of fortune (or misfortune, it depends), Loïc Libot, Luidgi Le Bars has only allowed himself 45 minutes of “sleep” in two days. “We feel that sleeping is becoming more important than eating,” believes Loïc, who has also just completed the UTMB, a few years after the TDS (145 km). If we don’t sleep at all, we no longer have motivation, no more juice. Whatever happens, giving up is not an option for me. “

That the festive atmosphere worthy of the Tour de France, with a campfire and “olé, olé” as the runners pass, in the night from Friday to Saturday at the level of the rise of Notre-Dame-de-la-Gorge (km 34), seems far away. Sick for long hours, the Swedish Caroline Olivia Elgan can no longer eat: “I feel very weak but I try to move forward section by section”.

“It’s the equivalent of the Superbowl for trail running”

Because like a Chinese, a Pole and a Norwegian seeming to hesitate to leave for the last 30 kilometers, at 7.55am, this edition still marked by the Covid-19 crisis, remains very international. Canadian Michelle Bousquet (45) even decided to come alone from Montreal for ten days. “Even in Canada, everyone knows that the UTMB is the equivalent of the Superbowl for trail running. It’s been a dream for me for eight years. I prepared it with the TDS and the CCC (101) then I was drawn, after two years of refusal. “

Alone and injured in the hand and in a knee after a fall from the 6th km, Michelle has been flirting with the time barriers since the middle of the race. “I’m so exhausted that I had to take two 20-minute naps on a table. It’s much harder than I expected. The morale is no longer there but I can not stop there. Ultra proves to me that I am strong and my two boys would not forgive me for giving up. The two pre-teens will be able to congratulate their mother, finisher of one of the hardest races in the world, even if she crossed the line after 46:45.

« Don’t worry, be happy, but you’ve got 10 minutes »

For this unassisted Quebecker, as for so many others registered, the UTMB volunteers play a precious role. “We can feel that these runners are looking for comfort, which goes beyond a soup and a coffee, confirms Guillaume, one of the members of the Trient supply. Our volunteer role is really there, and not when the best trail runners stop for a minute before aiming for a time. ”Not far from there, one of his Swiss acolytes announces at the microphone in an anthology English:“ Don’t worry, be happy, but you’ve got 10 minutes ”.

The feat of a trail runner’s life is worth nothing. On the 8 o’clock gong, a pale American arrives out of nowhere, and obtains the right to continue the adventure with the appearance of a reprieve. Ten minutes later, an Englishman must resign himself to stopping there, despite his attempts to convince the organization. The UTMB knows how to be cruel, but also liberating for Luidgi, Loïc, Antoine, Michelle, Caroline Olivia and the 1,520 finishers (out of 3,200 starters) of this crazy adventure.