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“ON TOP OF THE WORLD”
If you’re looking for the ultimate runner’s high, where better to go than the Himalayas?
Story and Photos by Steven Seaton
Originally appeared in Runner’s World, UK, March 1996 Edition
The downhill sections were becoming a nightmare. Not that they were particularly tough on the legs, but everyone know that if you 
were going down, then you would soon have to go up again.
The finish was at 12,000ft, in a town called Sandakphu. At least, on the course map it was a town. It’s actually no more than three spartan Sherpa huts and a dining hall, plus a secluded monastery a little way off. A few hardy families there eke out a though living from trekkers, yak trains and local porters passing by on their way further up the mountain.
Unfortunately, Sandakphu was at the top of a hill. A very big hill. Had it not been for the road snaking off through the clouds, you’d have looked to tackle it with the ropes and crampons. But for the runners tackling the first day of the Himalayan 100 Mile Stage Race, the problems are the false summits and descents that preceded it. By the time everyone reached that final hill they were exhausted, both physically and mentally.
That evening there were some desperate people huddled around the fire in the dining hut. 
Their thoughts were obvious. Four more days of this!
Patience is more than a virtue in India, it’s necessity. It doesn’t matter whether you’re waiting in the queue at the airport, changing your money at a bank or planning a five-day 100-mile romp through the mountains: India is a land for endurance athletes, not sprinters! After three days acclimatizing and sightseeing at Mirik – a stunningly picturesque town nestling at 5000ft in the Himalayan foothills – everyone in the 30-odd group of runners had learnt that lesson. It was an important one to remember for the days ahead.
The group which finally assembled at the start, near the Indian border with Nepal, was an international mix, mostly from Britain, the USA and Japan. Some were experienced ultra-runners, others had never even done a marathon and would be running consecutive days for the first time. Despite the presence of elite competitors like Britain’s Hilary Walker and Tomas Rusek of the Czech Republic, this wasn’t a big-money affair. First prize was a $50 watch and the admiration of your peers.
The start was a gloriously chaotic affair. The whole town seemed to have squeezed into the narrow main street for a glimpse of these strange foreigners wrapping towels around their heads and daubing sun cream all over their bodies. The local spectators were joined by a group of truck drivers who, seeing the crowd, had stopped to see what the commotion was about, and thus blocked the course with their vehicles. Meanwhile the race marshals, who were still struggling to hang up the start banner, were faring little better with crowd control. The whole shouting, horn-tooting mess was compounded by a couple of stray dogs running around and barking. They were eventually chased off in a hail of stones.
It was a blessed relief to hear the gun. At least, it was if you were sitting in a jeep. Ahead of the competitors lay five days and 100 testing miles of running. For most, it wasn’t so much a race as a personal challenge, an adventure in one of the most spectacular and remote areas of the world.
To create something that would promote a message of Himalayan conservation, while at the same time offering a once-in-a-lifetime running experience. It proved to be a successful formula The trip (or trips – the Stage Race is now followed by the Everest Marathon, Darjeeling 10K and Everest Bike Rally) has grown from 14 people in 1991 to more than 60. What’s more, the concept of eco-tourism underpinning the trip (i.e. that travelers see the environment in its natural state and leave behind nothing but the economic benefits of their passage) has proved popular with the Indian government, which is adopting this as a standard as it develops the Darjeeling area as the adventure sports capital of the country.
Not that many of the runners were thinking about eco-tourism as they took on the challenge of Day One – 20 odd miles and some hideous climbs. The first came almost immediately and left the initially sprightly group looking like a bunch of octogenarians gasping for breath. It was a slow, determined plod up a mountain path, and a 12-kilometer plod at that. Welcome to the Himalayas.
To make matters worse – and frankly, they didn’t need to be – the stage threw up several other obstacles. First, the altitude: the net gain in height was 5000ft, with the start at 7000ft and the finish at 12,000. Then there was the temperature swinging from scorching heat in some of the sheltered jungle areas to freezing cloud or snow near the hilltops.
Finally there was the terrain. Even on the rare flat spots, it was impossible to run with any confidence. The first day’s route followed a cobblestoned jeep track marking the border between Nepal and India. It was originally built in 1948 for the Aga Khan, the Muslim leader, to enable him to see Mount Everest. He never used it: one of his emissaries tried it and deemed it far too dangerous for his spiritual master.
After a bone-jarring hour riding along it in a jeep, staring over precipitous drops on either side, that seemed a perfectly reasonable viewpoint. The alternative of climbing it on foot seemed worse, though. The summit of the first hill finally arrived, followed by a long downhill section through a thickly forested jungle area where the wet leaves covering the cobblestones added a new element of danger. All too quickly the descent was over and it was up again. That was the pattern for the day: up, up again, then down.
The views were spectacular, but by the time everyone reached the last desperate climb up to Sandakphu, running in the Himalayan wilderness had definitely begun to lose its shine. The record for the first day is just over four hours: Rusek was closer to five and Walker an hour slower, with the bulk of the field trailing in between six and eight hours. To put that into perspective, a jeep takes four hours, while the record for a top professional mountain biker is seven.
The reward was the following morning’s sunrise. Sandakphu sat like an island on top of the clouds which lay deep below in the valleys on either side, blocking out everything but the massive mountains in the distance. On one side was a clear view of Everest, Lhotse and Makalu, three of the world’s five highest mountains. On the other was Kanchenjunga, the world’s third-highest peak and, from that angle, the most impressive of all.
Surprisingly, after several hot meals and a night tucked up in a sleeping bag, the deep depression of the previous night had lifted. There were some aching bodies rolling into breakfast that morning, but everyone made it. One of the lessons of running in a multi-day race concerns recovery: you can punish body mercilessly one day and, with good and rest, be back running the next, It’s surprising how straight forward 20 flattish miles at 12,000ft can seem after you’ve spent a day on the Himalayan stair climber.
Of course, there’s no such thing as flat ground in this part of the world, but Day Two had none of the torturous ascents of Day One. The jeep track was replaced by a yak trail which was easier to move on.
If distance and terrain weren’t problems that day, directions were. Several runners veered off into Nepal, and while most realized their error and turned back, one American woman inexplicably kept going. A tired mind is rarely a logical one. Her idea was to continue until she met someone who could redirect her. She was found by a jeep, disorientated and tearful, several miles off course.
The problem with the route marking was one of the few organizational hiccups – a great credit to C S Pandy, the Indian race director, and his staff. Considering the remote location and the logistics of transporting kitbags, food, cooking equipment and people up and mountains, this was astonishing.
By now the conditions, more than the itself, were starting to take a toll. After the first night in Sandakphu, a few people had suffered mild problems with the altitude. Swollen limbs, headaches and nausea were common, as was a loss of appetite, which was surprising considering the quality of food.
Yes, the quality of the food. You have to suspend your preconceptions when thinking about this trip. Forget the cliched picture of India – streets teeming with humanity, a place where every day is a four-shirt day. That’s Delhi. This was the India of snow capped mountains, of hillsides covered in a patchwork of tea plants, where the only signs of life were moon-faced porters struggling with impossible loads suspended from their foreheads. The biggest surprise was the food, which was quite sensational. Fresh-baked croissants at breakfast,home-made tomato soup at lunch and tiny individual apple pies at dinner were among the highlights. As one competitor remarked: I can’t believe I’m going to run 100 miles in India and still put on weight!
The menus, like every element of the organisation, had been planned months in advance. If you had looked in the weighty tome sent to everyone before the trip, you could have read exactly what was going to be served on each day. The importance of this didn’t strike me until I was on top of that mountain – it’s a tough enough event without adding dodgy food to the obstacles.
Never was that more true than on Day Three, the longest run of the trip. It was officially 28 miles, but most thought it closer to 30. The first 11 were identical to the previous day, a gently undulating course followed by a perilously steep descent of a deeply rutted ravine. In 6km the course dropped 4500ft, and with tired quads struggling for control, that was enough to put several runners on the injury list.
Climatically, it was Day One in reverse. The temperature picked up and the barren landscape on top of the mountain was transformed into dense green jungle interspersed with bamboo forests and colourful flora. After the sparse conditions in Sandakphu, the finish in Rimbik was like a tropical paradise. Palm trees offered shade from the midday sun, buckets of hot water appeared, and for once you could strip off layers of clothes and relax in the sunshine instead of snuggling up in a sleeping bag next to a paraffin stove.
By now, the wear and tear of over 70 mountainous miles in three days was showing. Even the camaraderie built up early, and reinforced by shared experience, couldn’t carry some tired bodies any further. A few had been on their feet for 10 or 11 hours on the third day, and almost everyone was suffering with some niggling injury or problem.
If you were going to be sick, this was the trip to be on. In addition to the official doctor, Margaret Brown, who was carrying the kind of pharmacy a medium-sized hospital would have been proud of, there were four or five other medics competing, including a surgeon and a psychiatrist. Unfortunately, what most competitors needed wasn’t medical attention but rest. With only two days to go, that wasn’t much of an option.
The penultimate stage, run on tarmac roads and only 13 miles long, was by far the easiest, Rusek finished in a shade over 90 minutes, but various patched-up bodies further back were out in the 70F heat for over four hours.
It was too much for some. One British women, Helen Masters (who hadn’t really recovered from 10 hours of running on Day Three), was forced to pull out before the final l7 mile run on doctor’s orders, suffering severe dehydration. She was inconsolable.
Only one other person from the original 31 failed to reach the finish. As predicted, Rusek and Walker dominated the elite races, winning every stage.
But for most it remained what it had always been, a race with no one but themselves. The sense of running in the personal achievement and accomplishment was immense, though the event was never close to being the desperate ordeal the first day had promised. If you could finish a marathon, you could have finished this. To prove the point, one British woman, Brigette Reinhart, who had intended to walk sections of the course while her husband ran, ended up completing the whole 100 miles.
© 1996 Runner’s World
