Ever since I joined Rudy in Kunming six months ago, he had been excitedly telling me tales of trail and adventure races all over China with incredible amounts of prize money, all put together by the mysterious and all-powerful Chinese Mountaineering Association (CMA). Rudy would spend hours in the depths of Chinese internet tracking down those races. The first results of this detective work were not promising: a CMA website with a classic Chinese picture, which we termed ‘Dudes Sitting in Front of Stuff’. ‘Dudes Siting in Front of Stuff’ is a generic picture of bored middle aged male bigwigs in a meeting, sitting behind a long table in front of a sign which states, in big characters, the purpose of the dudes being there. The site contained no information that we (or anyone for that matter) would be interested in. Emailing the head of the CMA was equally discouraging. To our questions, which Rudy had carefully crafted and bullet-pointed, we got a one line reply saying that the schedule of trail races will be sent to us soon.
I was in Kunming when I got a call from Rudy from Shangrila, which is an event in itself. In the interests of economy Rudy uses his mobile credits, to put it mildly, extremely sparingly. Rudy was excited, very excited. Emailing the mysterious colossus that is the CMA finally paid off. We were invited, all expenses paid, to a 20-something km trail race in a place called Yuntai Mountains National Park, somewhere in central China. Airport pick up, free hotel, food, airfare reimbursed and 10 000 yuan in prize money for the winner. Our spirits soared.
Fast-forward a month. Kunming - Zhengjiang flight was delayed by almost two hours. We were killing time reading ‘The National Geographic’ and ‘Outdoor China’ sitting on the floor by the departure gate. Rudy’s Mohawk and bright green-blue racing flats (Brooks Green Silence) drew stares, with many bored passengers coming closer for a better look at this unusual type of foreigner. The fact that the foreigners had Chinese magazines and appeared to be reading them sparked discussions whether we were actually reading or just looking at the pictures. Nobody thought of asking us.
The food on the plane was surprisingly palatable, we wolfed down it down and began to wonder who or what is waiting for us when we land. To our relief there was a girl with a sign at the arrivals area, who took us to our car(!) informing us on the way that it was a two hour drive to the hotel. The car came with a stocky driver, who looked Samoan and had lethal breath. Equally lethal were the road (all lane markings and road lights soon vanished) and the Samoan’s driving. After the second sudden swerve we started to strongly suspect that the Samoan was falling asleep. It was past midnight and the driver and the girl had been waiting in the airport for hours. The girl was by now asleep and the Samoan was desperately trying not to be. Fortunately the second swerve and the hotel were only minutes apart.
The hotel was great, individual rooms , TV and hot water. After sleeping on the couch and washing out of a bucket with cold water in Shangrila (Delta Force Shower as we called it) it was a very welcome change. We had some instant noodles, I watched a bit of Bear Grylls’ ’Man v Wild’ (lots of useful outdoor vocabulary) where Mr Grylls managed to catch an agama lizard (active only during the day), in a nigthtime trap. Marvelling at Mr Grylls’ sublime trapping skills I fell asleep.
I woke up at a reasonable hour and, starving and grumpy and set off in search of breakfast. Having tracked down the hotel restaurant I confronted the first person I saw, a peasanty – looking woman ferrying piles of plates, about free breakfast for athletes. The woman panicked and refused to understand me. Once the panic subsided and she understood what I was ranting on about, she smiled and started shooing me away shouting that breakfast has been eaten. I got some overpriced instant noodles instead.
While I was eating instant noodles Rudy knocked on my door with a cup of coffee. Fortified by coffee and noodles we went to register. By this time the hotel complex was filled with competitors, mainly jolly (some rather portly) middle aged weekend runners and hikers, many with a cigarette on the go. There were also some fit-looking and well-groomed young guys wearing cutting-edge tight gear so popular with western runners. Those two did not were not worried about; we were on the lookout for our rivals, little skinny guys from sports schools wearing cheap Chinese-brand tracksuits and flimsy Do-Win brand trainers. The number of the ‘little dudes’, as we affectionately called them, was inversely proportional to the potential amount of money we could win. I noticed a number of ‘little dudes’, but not in the quantity sufficient to raise alarm. Having collected our shiny race information booklet we started analysing the invited runners, scanning the list for the dreaded ‘ bla-bla-bla city/province sports school’, which would mean a 2:20 marathon PB. The immediate points of concern were the Li-ning Team and several runners from the geology university in Beijing. Rather than further worrying about the rivals we decided to have a strategic nap.
My strategic nap was interrupted by a Chinese TV crew knocking on the door asking if we minded to do an interview. We agreed to meet in front of the hotel in 5 minutes. After the interview was over I was just hoping that the whole thing would never be on air or that I would be edited out. Sleepy and nervous I had muttered what seemed like complete gibberish and then rather stupidly added that in Europe we would not stand a chance of a podium place but we were could hope of becoming a champion here in China. Considering we would be running with guys with sub 2:15 marathon PBs for whom the prize money was equivalent of 3 months’ salary, this was not the smartest thing to say. Rudy looked at me with disgust and took over the interview. ‘Great’ said the interviewer when the ordeal was over, ‘but could you add something about The Grand Canyon? Yuntai Park is twinned with the Grand Canyon, would be good to hear an American compare the two’. ‘I have never been to the Grand Canyon’, said Rudy. ‘Oh, that does not matter, say that you have and then just say whatever’. Rudy duly delivered and we were free, but the middle-aged hiking contingent was lying in ambush for photos with (they assumed us to be), elite foreign runners. We spent the next 15 minutes uncomfortably smiling to the camera while hugging a never-ending stream of very sweet and excited middle aged couples who would excitedly shout in English ‘good!’ followed by ‘good Chinese!’ after their photo was taken.
Lunch exceeded our expectations. We happily tucked into carbs, keeping an eye out for the ‘little dudes’ while the waify camp waiter was keeping an eye on us. After lunch he plucked up the courage informing us that a) he used to be an 800m runner at university and that b) we were handsome.
The provincial government that organized the race spent a colossal amount on it: the signs and banners for ‘Mount Yuntai International Mountaineering Challenge’ were on every bridge, lamppost and most of the trees lining the roads. TV crews milled around. Each floor of the hotel building had a maid standing to attention. Quite a change after my last races in the Surrey League in South London. The settings of the hotel, however, were less than inspiring: flat, barren, dusty landscape with small nondescript buildings and a blanket of smog hanging over it, the outline of the mountains barely visible on the horizon. An enormous chimney stack dominated the surroundings.
Race day
There were lots of ‘little dudes’ on the starting line in the colossal car park at the entrance to the national park. They looked tough, hungry and very fast. Nobody had trail shoes, leggings, gels or hydration systems. Just standard issue sports school Do-Win racing flats, singlets and running shorts.
From the race booklet we knew that the course was 24km, first 10km straight up, then a plateau then a 7k descent. Concrete, stairs and trail. 5 drinks stations along the way. The scenery was stunning, with the great rock walls of Yuntai range rising suddenly out of the plain. We were to run a compete loop around the first great tower and finish back in the vast car park at the National Park entrance.
We took off uphill on the road at a 5:40 mile pace. I was about 10th, with Rudy’s Mohawk bobbing ahead of me in the leading pack. We swerved around the corner and hit the stairs. Running turned to powerwalk, then a walk. The leading pack pulled away, taking Rudy and his Mohawk with it. Several ‘little dudes’ overtook me while telling me to ‘add fuel’, literal translation of Chinese version of ‘C’mon’. After 3k of stairs my thighs were screaming , calves were on the verge of cramping and I was crawling. A young kid overtook me but then started to fade, first pulling himself up by the railings, then crawling up on all fours. He eventually stood aside and let me pass, not forgetting to tell me to ‘add fuel’ as I lumbered by. I was feeling horrendous, a mixture of fatigue, dehydration, shame and bitter disappointment. Putting in 100mile weeks at altitude, starving myself into a new racing shape, I was feeling quite smug before the race and fancied my chances. Now I was being passed and I was dying. Sod this running full-time, I kept saying to myself, I am done. This is crap. The climbs were interspersed with descents and I went kamikaze – style full out tumbling down the concrete stairs as fast as I could, passing several runners. I wanted to fall and get injured, because this would have meant stopping and not running anymore.
Eventually the stairs ended. I caught glimpses of the stunning scenery, but I as far as I was concerned I might have as well been running in a pedestrian underpass. I perked up in the shade of the trail and congratulated myself on my sagacity of having chosen my ultra-grippy Mizuno fell racers rather than road racing flats. The trail was wet and quite slippery. With no runners in sight, I bombed it down the trail. Soon I caught another runner who also courteously ‘add-fuel-ed’ me as I went past.
Arriving at a drinks station I demanded sports drink, from a volunteer who was visibly very excited to serve his second foreign runner, Rudy and his Mohawk having been the first one a few minutes previously . Having downed one half-filled cup of the sugary Chinese sports drink I then grabbed an entire bottle and took off hearing the volunteer’s shouting ‘no, you can’t do that’ and his colleagues’ laughing. My calves were dangerously close to cramping, and I did not want to take any chances.
The descent turned rocky and very steep, my quads were burning , but I was still hoping to catch a couple of runners, secretly harbouring a fantasy of finishing in the top 10. I suddenly saw a ‘little dude’ in front of me on a small climb, but when I turned a corner he vanished. There was no sign of him for the next few minutes and I was wondering if he actually fell off the trail. Then I almost ran him over as around a corner, he looked rough and was barely moving, having cooked himself trying to shake me off. Unfailingly there was a pat on the back and an ‘add fuel’.
Encouraged by having caught another runner I pressed on on the descent, but after another mile my legs turned to jelly. I was suddenly walking (or running) a fine line between trying to go fast and not losing control of my increasingly wobbly legs and crashing. Bizarrely the race staff on the trail kept telling me to slow down out of concern for my safety.
Two things caught my eye: a sign saying two km to go and another runner. The runner was a guy with both arms amputated just below the elbow. I remembered him, he was on our bus from the hotel to the race start. What he lacked in the arms department he more made up in the thighs area. The dude looked very strong. He heard me, looked behind and accelerated. I could not catch up and my left calf was on the verge of cramping. With 500m to go I settled for finishing behind the guy with no arms, but was desperately hoping that I would not cramp. I did not cramp, the guy with no arms beat me by 20 seconds or so and I crossed the line in the 14th place.
Rudy had finished 8 minutes earlier, in 6th pace, 8 min behind the winner, who completed the course in 2:01. I was bitterly disappointed with my placing, and so was Rudy with his. Having spoken to other competitors and learning about their PBs we felt a lot better about ourselves. The winner was an ex pro with a 2:10 marathon, making a living racing for money, apparently winning every race his enters. The runner up had a PB of 2:12. The guy who finished behind me transpired to have a 2:30 marathon and another guy who behind him ran in Chinese Olympic marathon trials. Prize money also made us feel better, Rudy’s sixth place was worth 3200RMB, my 14th a measly 800. Mingling with runners, we found out about a lot of other races that we had never heard about, and got invited to several. At dinner a slightly drunk ‘little dude’ kept insisting that we should be charging an appearance fee because us taking part makes the race officially ‘international’.
The final highlight of a great race and great event was our lunch at the hotel (courtesy of the CMA) before being taken to the airport. After much deliberation we went for duck and venison and a local speciality which was recommended by the extremely helpful and eager to please waitress. The speciality turned out to be shredded cow stomach with noodles and spam in spicy broth of dynamite strength. We picked at the stomach, but stayed clear of the spam.
I was in Kunming when I got a call from Rudy from Shangrila, which is an event in itself. In the interests of economy Rudy uses his mobile credits, to put it mildly, extremely sparingly. Rudy was excited, very excited. Emailing the mysterious colossus that is the CMA finally paid off. We were invited, all expenses paid, to a 20-something km trail race in a place called Yuntai Mountains National Park, somewhere in central China. Airport pick up, free hotel, food, airfare reimbursed and 10 000 yuan in prize money for the winner. Our spirits soared.
Fast-forward a month. Kunming - Zhengjiang flight was delayed by almost two hours. We were killing time reading ‘The National Geographic’ and ‘Outdoor China’ sitting on the floor by the departure gate. Rudy’s Mohawk and bright green-blue racing flats (Brooks Green Silence) drew stares, with many bored passengers coming closer for a better look at this unusual type of foreigner. The fact that the foreigners had Chinese magazines and appeared to be reading them sparked discussions whether we were actually reading or just looking at the pictures. Nobody thought of asking us.
The food on the plane was surprisingly palatable, we wolfed down it down and began to wonder who or what is waiting for us when we land. To our relief there was a girl with a sign at the arrivals area, who took us to our car(!) informing us on the way that it was a two hour drive to the hotel. The car came with a stocky driver, who looked Samoan and had lethal breath. Equally lethal were the road (all lane markings and road lights soon vanished) and the Samoan’s driving. After the second sudden swerve we started to strongly suspect that the Samoan was falling asleep. It was past midnight and the driver and the girl had been waiting in the airport for hours. The girl was by now asleep and the Samoan was desperately trying not to be. Fortunately the second swerve and the hotel were only minutes apart.
The hotel was great, individual rooms , TV and hot water. After sleeping on the couch and washing out of a bucket with cold water in Shangrila (Delta Force Shower as we called it) it was a very welcome change. We had some instant noodles, I watched a bit of Bear Grylls’ ’Man v Wild’ (lots of useful outdoor vocabulary) where Mr Grylls managed to catch an agama lizard (active only during the day), in a nigthtime trap. Marvelling at Mr Grylls’ sublime trapping skills I fell asleep.
I woke up at a reasonable hour and, starving and grumpy and set off in search of breakfast. Having tracked down the hotel restaurant I confronted the first person I saw, a peasanty – looking woman ferrying piles of plates, about free breakfast for athletes. The woman panicked and refused to understand me. Once the panic subsided and she understood what I was ranting on about, she smiled and started shooing me away shouting that breakfast has been eaten. I got some overpriced instant noodles instead.
While I was eating instant noodles Rudy knocked on my door with a cup of coffee. Fortified by coffee and noodles we went to register. By this time the hotel complex was filled with competitors, mainly jolly (some rather portly) middle aged weekend runners and hikers, many with a cigarette on the go. There were also some fit-looking and well-groomed young guys wearing cutting-edge tight gear so popular with western runners. Those two did not were not worried about; we were on the lookout for our rivals, little skinny guys from sports schools wearing cheap Chinese-brand tracksuits and flimsy Do-Win brand trainers. The number of the ‘little dudes’, as we affectionately called them, was inversely proportional to the potential amount of money we could win. I noticed a number of ‘little dudes’, but not in the quantity sufficient to raise alarm. Having collected our shiny race information booklet we started analysing the invited runners, scanning the list for the dreaded ‘ bla-bla-bla city/province sports school’, which would mean a 2:20 marathon PB. The immediate points of concern were the Li-ning Team and several runners from the geology university in Beijing. Rather than further worrying about the rivals we decided to have a strategic nap.
My strategic nap was interrupted by a Chinese TV crew knocking on the door asking if we minded to do an interview. We agreed to meet in front of the hotel in 5 minutes. After the interview was over I was just hoping that the whole thing would never be on air or that I would be edited out. Sleepy and nervous I had muttered what seemed like complete gibberish and then rather stupidly added that in Europe we would not stand a chance of a podium place but we were could hope of becoming a champion here in China. Considering we would be running with guys with sub 2:15 marathon PBs for whom the prize money was equivalent of 3 months’ salary, this was not the smartest thing to say. Rudy looked at me with disgust and took over the interview. ‘Great’ said the interviewer when the ordeal was over, ‘but could you add something about The Grand Canyon? Yuntai Park is twinned with the Grand Canyon, would be good to hear an American compare the two’. ‘I have never been to the Grand Canyon’, said Rudy. ‘Oh, that does not matter, say that you have and then just say whatever’. Rudy duly delivered and we were free, but the middle-aged hiking contingent was lying in ambush for photos with (they assumed us to be), elite foreign runners. We spent the next 15 minutes uncomfortably smiling to the camera while hugging a never-ending stream of very sweet and excited middle aged couples who would excitedly shout in English ‘good!’ followed by ‘good Chinese!’ after their photo was taken.
Lunch exceeded our expectations. We happily tucked into carbs, keeping an eye out for the ‘little dudes’ while the waify camp waiter was keeping an eye on us. After lunch he plucked up the courage informing us that a) he used to be an 800m runner at university and that b) we were handsome.
The provincial government that organized the race spent a colossal amount on it: the signs and banners for ‘Mount Yuntai International Mountaineering Challenge’ were on every bridge, lamppost and most of the trees lining the roads. TV crews milled around. Each floor of the hotel building had a maid standing to attention. Quite a change after my last races in the Surrey League in South London. The settings of the hotel, however, were less than inspiring: flat, barren, dusty landscape with small nondescript buildings and a blanket of smog hanging over it, the outline of the mountains barely visible on the horizon. An enormous chimney stack dominated the surroundings.
Race day
There were lots of ‘little dudes’ on the starting line in the colossal car park at the entrance to the national park. They looked tough, hungry and very fast. Nobody had trail shoes, leggings, gels or hydration systems. Just standard issue sports school Do-Win racing flats, singlets and running shorts.
From the race booklet we knew that the course was 24km, first 10km straight up, then a plateau then a 7k descent. Concrete, stairs and trail. 5 drinks stations along the way. The scenery was stunning, with the great rock walls of Yuntai range rising suddenly out of the plain. We were to run a compete loop around the first great tower and finish back in the vast car park at the National Park entrance.
We took off uphill on the road at a 5:40 mile pace. I was about 10th, with Rudy’s Mohawk bobbing ahead of me in the leading pack. We swerved around the corner and hit the stairs. Running turned to powerwalk, then a walk. The leading pack pulled away, taking Rudy and his Mohawk with it. Several ‘little dudes’ overtook me while telling me to ‘add fuel’, literal translation of Chinese version of ‘C’mon’. After 3k of stairs my thighs were screaming , calves were on the verge of cramping and I was crawling. A young kid overtook me but then started to fade, first pulling himself up by the railings, then crawling up on all fours. He eventually stood aside and let me pass, not forgetting to tell me to ‘add fuel’ as I lumbered by. I was feeling horrendous, a mixture of fatigue, dehydration, shame and bitter disappointment. Putting in 100mile weeks at altitude, starving myself into a new racing shape, I was feeling quite smug before the race and fancied my chances. Now I was being passed and I was dying. Sod this running full-time, I kept saying to myself, I am done. This is crap. The climbs were interspersed with descents and I went kamikaze – style full out tumbling down the concrete stairs as fast as I could, passing several runners. I wanted to fall and get injured, because this would have meant stopping and not running anymore.
Eventually the stairs ended. I caught glimpses of the stunning scenery, but I as far as I was concerned I might have as well been running in a pedestrian underpass. I perked up in the shade of the trail and congratulated myself on my sagacity of having chosen my ultra-grippy Mizuno fell racers rather than road racing flats. The trail was wet and quite slippery. With no runners in sight, I bombed it down the trail. Soon I caught another runner who also courteously ‘add-fuel-ed’ me as I went past.
Arriving at a drinks station I demanded sports drink, from a volunteer who was visibly very excited to serve his second foreign runner, Rudy and his Mohawk having been the first one a few minutes previously . Having downed one half-filled cup of the sugary Chinese sports drink I then grabbed an entire bottle and took off hearing the volunteer’s shouting ‘no, you can’t do that’ and his colleagues’ laughing. My calves were dangerously close to cramping, and I did not want to take any chances.
The descent turned rocky and very steep, my quads were burning , but I was still hoping to catch a couple of runners, secretly harbouring a fantasy of finishing in the top 10. I suddenly saw a ‘little dude’ in front of me on a small climb, but when I turned a corner he vanished. There was no sign of him for the next few minutes and I was wondering if he actually fell off the trail. Then I almost ran him over as around a corner, he looked rough and was barely moving, having cooked himself trying to shake me off. Unfailingly there was a pat on the back and an ‘add fuel’.
Encouraged by having caught another runner I pressed on on the descent, but after another mile my legs turned to jelly. I was suddenly walking (or running) a fine line between trying to go fast and not losing control of my increasingly wobbly legs and crashing. Bizarrely the race staff on the trail kept telling me to slow down out of concern for my safety.
Two things caught my eye: a sign saying two km to go and another runner. The runner was a guy with both arms amputated just below the elbow. I remembered him, he was on our bus from the hotel to the race start. What he lacked in the arms department he more made up in the thighs area. The dude looked very strong. He heard me, looked behind and accelerated. I could not catch up and my left calf was on the verge of cramping. With 500m to go I settled for finishing behind the guy with no arms, but was desperately hoping that I would not cramp. I did not cramp, the guy with no arms beat me by 20 seconds or so and I crossed the line in the 14th place.
Rudy had finished 8 minutes earlier, in 6th pace, 8 min behind the winner, who completed the course in 2:01. I was bitterly disappointed with my placing, and so was Rudy with his. Having spoken to other competitors and learning about their PBs we felt a lot better about ourselves. The winner was an ex pro with a 2:10 marathon, making a living racing for money, apparently winning every race his enters. The runner up had a PB of 2:12. The guy who finished behind me transpired to have a 2:30 marathon and another guy who behind him ran in Chinese Olympic marathon trials. Prize money also made us feel better, Rudy’s sixth place was worth 3200RMB, my 14th a measly 800. Mingling with runners, we found out about a lot of other races that we had never heard about, and got invited to several. At dinner a slightly drunk ‘little dude’ kept insisting that we should be charging an appearance fee because us taking part makes the race officially ‘international’.
The final highlight of a great race and great event was our lunch at the hotel (courtesy of the CMA) before being taken to the airport. After much deliberation we went for duck and venison and a local speciality which was recommended by the extremely helpful and eager to please waitress. The speciality turned out to be shredded cow stomach with noodles and spam in spicy broth of dynamite strength. We picked at the stomach, but stayed clear of the spam.