UTMB Nice 2024 recap
Gear
Runners: North Face Summit Vectiv Pro 2
Worked out brilliantly - super cushioned, felt like I was floating on the downhills, zero blisters/pain-points. Probably a bit overkill for my speed however, I purchased them as I’d read enough to see that they also help with fatigue resistance and recovery so…. I will note on runs since that were ‘hard/fast’, the potential in carbon ‘supershoes’ is there on trails….
Poles: Leki UltraTrail FX.One SuperLite
Very much a race-day pole - I wouldn’t use them daily as they seem too fragile for bog in Ireland. Great pole overall though and they’ll be great to pull out events.
Jacket: Patagonia Storm Racer
Purchased due to Patagonia’s incredible repair program. Trying to do a small bit of sustainability.
Rain leggings: OMM Halo pants
Ridiculously light, and tiny to pack, and probably ridiculously fragile for the same reason.
Heat torch: Petzl Nao RL
t-shirt: random Nike running t-shirt
shorts: Decathlon trail shorts
Race report
This is a brief overview of my experience throughout the day, including the logistics of getting to the start line, etc. Bear with me as my writing is very rusty and I’ve returned to elementary level writing skills ;)
Let's start the night before. In short, you get a bus from Nice at 2:30am to the start line. That meant I was getting up at 1am as there was a 2km walk to complete to the bus collection location. And as I was up at 1am, that meant trying to go to sleep at 8pm to try and get even 4-5 hours sleep which was impossible as I’m used to getting to bed around two hours later than that. I learned a good lesson here immediately: I should have taken a half day and gone to bed at lunch for a couple of hours then gone to bed at a more usual time of 9-10pm and just grabbing a few hours beforehand.
After getting up, having a bagel, strapping my right grumpy ankle and deciding after strapping my left that I didn’t need it there (mistake as I’ll comment on below), getting by bags, I strolled through a sleepy Nice meeting some partygoers heading home alongside an ever increasing number of fellow runners making the trek over. The very savvy ones cycled the distance on an Uber shard bike - another lesson learned for next time…..
The bus takes 2 hours (roughly) and then the runners start learning in waves from 6am until 7:15am. That means potentially standing around for 2 hours. The start line is at 1300m and it’s October - we got 3-5 degrees.
The positive is you bring your drop bag to the start line and it’s - literally - 50 metres from the actual start - so pack an extra thermal top or jacket and then dump it into the drop bag. You won’t need it later in the day, but you’ll be glad of it at the start before you’re moving.
As for the early bus, it meant I was up at 1am to get kit on, and stroll 2km to the bus collection point. My usual bed time in 10/10:30 and attempting to go to bed at 8:30 didn’t work out - I’m just not used to sleeping at that time (Even when tired). So, what I’d try next time is finish work at lunch and go to bed for an 1-1.5 hour snooze, then try go to bed at normal hour of 10pm. It’s still not a full nights sleep but probably the only chance of getting more rest for msyelf at least.
For the start, you’ve a 10 minute walk down into Roubion from the bus drop-off and then its pretty chaotic in the tiny village with 1100 people sorting themselves out while dropping off drop bags, etc. Cosy! As the waves move out, however, it improves steadily. I’d probably Bring an extra thermal top which I’d leave in the drop bag also as it was around 3-5 degrees while there.
Note to self: the first kilometre or so is a wide firewood, however, it then narrows down to single track and it’s slowwww….. make sure you’re in the right place in your wave if you’re keen to keep moving. After that the run slowly settled in.
On the day, I followed Zone 2 on my Coros watch (with heart rate monitor) trying to push as much as I could into Zone 2 on the downhills, and keeping to the top-end of Zone 2 on the uphills. It worked, although I definitely feel like I left time on the table on the day by being conservative in this approach also - i.e. I didn’t do it always and there was room there, as well as dipping into Zone 3 at times also. A lesson learned for when I race an event like this next time…..
What was interesting was my UTMB index was quite a low ranking so I went off in one of the last waves. This was a positive as I had no pressure on myself, however, it was a negative due to overtaking - I was behind a lot of people who I was faster than and it turns out lots of narrow single-track means it’s hard to get by and you have get vocal! People were always pleasant, however, my inexperience showed as I stuck behind people on multiple occasions for much too long and should have been pushing on.
The first aid four aid stations passed without incident however, I was starting to notice a slight stomach issue by aid station 5 (~50km in) and, much to my surprise, some chafing issues with my shorts. I’ve never had an issue like that in all my years and it was something I needed up managing with increasing discomfort for the rest of the race, I realised after the race, I did something I’ve never done before: I tied the waist string tight! My only assumption is it pulled up the materials too tight leading to the various problems that developed… Doh and a lesson learned!
Aid station 6 is the drop-bag. Here, based on the material issue above and the stomach getting more and more unsettled, I took what was meant to be a longer stop but not too long. In every other station, I was I and out within 3-4 minutes - my planned stop of 15 minutes become 35! Another lesson learned to set a timer…
The next aid stations passed away, each requiring a little ‘skin care’, until aid station 7 where I needed to take a 20 minute stop to attempt some strapping (unsuccessfully I might add). Then it was a case of pushing on - and as luck would have it, just before aid station 8, I bumped into another Irish runner (who’d I’d briefly chatted with earlier), Kieran. We sided up and finished out the rest together which was great for a bit of social banter. The final hill was brutal, and we over-pushed it so that the final few kms of the event was essentially a walk - neither of us showing motivation to push on. As I crossed the finish line, my body then crashed due the lack of food in the previous 8 hours and then it was a case of attempting to put down some food, grab an Uber home while staying warm and passing out.
Nutrition
I had been listening to quite a few podcasts and learned the concept of getting a decent quantity of carbs per hour, ideally a minimum of 60 grams of carbohydrates, pushing up into the (Crazy mid-140’s). So, I’d gone with a strategy of aiming to hit 60m minimum per hour, but aiming to push up to 90grams.
The approach was a mix of Maurten gels and Tailwind mixed into drinks which I’d tested before on both short runs and recent 55km event.
How did it go?
In short, it was all going well -for the most part - until around half way through. The lesson learned was that at the speeds I’m going, I don’t need to hit 90g every hour, however, I should hit it as a minimum every 2-3 hours and even go well above that. The other learning was that Tailwind every hour does not go very well for myself, especially when the doses aren’t perfectly accurate with some being too dense (i.e. over 2 scoops) which starts to have issues on my stomach. What wasn’t clear after that was why the Maurten gels were not a favour either - my feeling is I hadn’t trained it enough to run when the body/mind is getting fatigued and that tastes may start to do interesting things…
12 hours in and it all started to fall apart and in the final 7 hours, I managed to take on about….150g (optimistically) in total. Oops. I dropped the ball here. What was interesting was that because I’d kept up good intake for the first 50+% of the event, my speed didn’t drop off, however, when I finished I had a major crash with severe shaking/rattles.
On top of all this, I learned that - in particular when it’s warm - I need to improve my salt/electrolyte intake with either salt tablets or an electrolyte mixed into water.
What will I do next? Likely lean into some more solid/plain food, reduce the hourly Tailwind intake, and increase my ‘training’ with gels (pushing harder than I’d even do in an event).
Conclusion
So, that’s a wrap! A genuinely great experience overall and a lot of learning to take away from it for a future event. The most interesting insight was realised that by sticking to zone 2, I had been too conservative! How nice it is to know that there is extra performance without even having to train :)
with that, thanks for reading and enjoy your next adventure!