Trail des cretes du Chablais
After our winter in the Trois Vallees ski area, Lorna and I
are now spending the summer in Chatel, in the Portes du Soleil area. It’s a
great ski area, but more importantly at the moment a fantastic summer area.
We’ve settled in to our little apartment (read bedsit), which for seasonnaire
accommodation is actually pretty huge. As soon as we arrived I started to dream
of running around the stunning mountains and ridges surrounding Chatel, and
after about two weeks of living here I even found a race to enter! The first of
many I hope, and even better it was supported by Scott, so it must be good!
Here’s a quick blog about it…
“Trail des cretes du Chablais” translates as “Trail of the
ridges of the Chablais region”. There were three races on offer, an 18km (1200m
ascent), 42km (2900m ascent), and the monster “Le Contrabandier” race, with
5600m ascent over 76km. I don’t think I’ve ever actually entered a race with
more ascent. The route would take us from Chatel south towards and then over
the Pointe de Masse, then to the Tavanuese region, before turning north to the
village of Abondance for the main checkpoint and roughly halfway point. From
Abondance at about 900m we would ascend the Cornettes du Bise at 2432m, then a
few more ups and downs before the final climb to Morclan and the gradual
descent back to Chatel.
Well, that was the plan. Unfortunately the weather did not
want to play. The two weeks before the race were really really wet. At the end
of our winter season the running in April had felt like summer, but now I felt
like we’d receded back into winter. Each morning the clouds would fill the
valley, perhaps occasionally rising during the afternoon but only to turn into
a spectacular storm for the evening. Fantastic to watch, not great for ensuring
snow-clear summits… To cut a long story short, the organisers did a fantastic
job to give us a course to race round. The 76km became 69 (though as work
prevented my attendance at the briefing I didn’t know this till Abondance!),
and the 5600m became 5000. This still sounded plenty as I stood around in the
centre of Chatel waiting for the 3am start. Everyone around me looked lean and
fast, and like they were born with batons in their hands. Mine felt heavy and
awkward, I’d only run with them once so this would be a baptism of fire!
Nervous selfie at 2:45 |
It was great to get started. The race had quite a presence
in the village with its big marquee and inflatable finish line, and quite a few
people came out to cheer us off, all the way up through the village. Some of
them even looked sober.
The NASA countdown now appears to be standard in European races! |
After the small tarmac start section we headed out on a
little trail contouring around the French / Swiss border ridge and then dropped
down to the main road, very close to where Lorna and I live. Then up the other
side and the first climb began… I was in a group of about 10 at the front, but
as we climbed I felt I was working hard and dropped back slightly, wondering if
it was too soon after the Peak district trigs. I went to strap the batons on,
immediately hit a man behind me in the balls and had to apologise. It seemed
rude not to let him past me, so that was another place lost and I was about 15th.
This felt a sensible place to be though I was not feeling particularly sprightly,
so I plodded on and tried to get some of the race under my belt.
The first section to Abondance, which turned out to be about
32kms, had some utterly spectacular sections. Due to the re-routed course we
did a fair bit of high level traversing rather than ascending the planned
summits, which for safety reasons had been roped by the organisers. This meant
in one case an incredible traverse of 200m or so across a very steep snow
slope, kicking steps whilst holding on to a fixed line, following a line of headtorches
beneath the towering summits above. It was at this point that I realised that
there is a very specific set of skills required for racing at this level in the
Alps – and all that core strength and balance Stu Hale keeps telling me to work
on would suddenly be very useful. I tried to go fast across these technical
sections but I just couldn’t, I was wearing a pair of brand new Scott Kinabalu
Enduro but kept slipping and nearly launching myself rapidly towards the valley
floor. The guys around me made it look so easy! I’m not sure if I lost places
on these sections but I certainly felt I’d worked harder than, and lost time
to, those around me. After about 3 and a half hours, a village appeared in the
valley below me, which surprised me. It turned out to be Abondance, where I’d
not expected to be for another hour and a half. At the checkpoint in the
village I discovered the new distance of the race, and learned that the second
“half” was further with more climb. I had arrived not feeling too great, but after
a good helping of Alpine checkpoint food (mostly cheese, dried sausage and
coke) I set off with renewed vigour! I’d also realised on the final descent
(yes, it took me THAT long), that perhaps some of the speedy runners who I’d
now lost sight of in front of me were running the relay, meaning that they were
only going to Abondance where they’d hand over to their partner for the second
half. This obviously meant I wouldn’t be racing them, which was great, but
meant that I now had no idea how many people were ahead of me.
Abondance |
The climb from Abondance started on the road, up through the
famous Abbey and eventually out onto trails leading towards the Refuge d’Ubine,
and then the col of the same name, and finally via a ridiculously long snowy
traverse in now zero visibility to our revised high point on the Cornettes du
Bise (about 2100m of the 2400m summit). The traverse was very memorable, but at
the time VERY frustrating. I was running through fog, able to just see one of
the little pink marker flags stuck in the snow from the previous one,
constantly traversing and climbing up to my right, with an unknown drop off to
the left. Every so often I’d cross an area which had avalanched during the
winter and have to pick the route through snow and rock debris. The frustration
came from my slow progress, again due to technical inability! Finally I was
descending, and it soon became apparent that sliding on my bum was the quickest
way down. A relay runner on Team HOKA came past, able to ski on his shoes rather
than having to bumslide like me. It wasn’t that much faster, but probably a lot
more comfortable.
Eventually the route turned south again and after dropping
from the high mountains through some fantastic areas, and some refuges I
certainly plan to visit again, our route was joined by those of the other two
races. This meant that after being alone for at least 3 hours I was joined by
loads of other runners. I now knew the finish was not too far, maybe 15kms, and
was keen to press on and get there. I felt pretty good and ate the last of my
four gels on one of what felt like it should be the last little climb. However
each time I thought this there would be one more. None of them were big, but
after a race of huge ups and downs, these 100m or so ascents felt harder and
harder!
All three races were now together and the trails had finally given in
to the weather. There was a LOT of mud! Grip became a distant memory and
everyone just tried to remain upright whilst heading broadly downwards. On the
final descent to the Super Chatel area I gave in and let gravity take its
course, bum sliding on gravel-y mud hurts even more than on snow! I now felt
great though and was passing runners from the 42 and 18km courses. After a
totally brilliant race the final descent was unfortunately a contrast to the
beauty and solitude of early sections, the narrow trails were a couple of
inches deep in mud and everyone was either in the way or stuck behind someone…
I was really trying and one over ambitious overtaking manoeuvre ended up with
me flat on my face in the mud, now completely covered and with one of the
bloody batons half way down the hill to my left. I gathered it up and resigned
myself to a time just over 10 hours. It didn’t matter though, given how crap
I’d felt earlier in the race I was pleased to be finishing. I’d learnt a lot
and hoped I might manage a top 20 position.
Up there! |
Finally the finish line was in sight, then, as it always
does, it ended. My time was 10:10:33, which turned out to be enough for 9th
place. The winner took about an hour and a half off that though, which shows
where I need to be aiming for. Congratulations to everyone who completed any of
the races this weekend, and a huge thank you to the organisers for working so
hard to put on a race for us. It was just possible to run in a t-shirt, but the
marshals on the high mountains looked freezing so Merci Beaucoup to them, and
thanks for keeping an eye on us over the roped sections. I can’t wait to work
on my alpine running skills and hopefully run this race again next year.
Brilliant marshals and checkpoints |
Thanks very much to my employers (Alpine Quests – the best
chalet company in Chatel by miles!) for allowing me the morning off, to Scott
for sorting out the entry and for making such great shoes that I could wear
them out of the box for this race and not end up with any damage to my feet at
all, and to Accelerate for continuing to support and coach me despite my international wandering.
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