Well I figured half the battle was won by arriving at the start line. Oh how wrong I was!

Chamonix is an amazing place, huge mountains and glaciers visible from everywhere. Fit people striding around with their backpacks. Parapenters filling the skies. The town was absolutely  abuzz with race excitement. I enjoyed myself enormously in the myriad of sports shops. So it was with a SHOPPERS high that I found myself  in the front starting box of the UTMB.
They began to play their famous starting music ( which I found quite funny actually) and we were off in pouring rain. I made my classic and extremely witty “No one told me there were hills!” Joke and there was deathly silence ooops no one spoke English.
I was pretty happy until the first hill where I came to a grinding halt and was passed by streams of people marching up with sticks.

Mistake No1: I considered myself too high and mighty for  cheating sticks.

Jean having a sit down mid UTMB.

After a muddy downhill ( yahooooo) there was a muddy up . Without sticks it was one step up two steps back. Again heaps of people passed me. From this point on any delusions of grandeur I had were gone and  my aim was to enjoy myself and finish.
The rain stopped and the second major climb up Croix du Bonhomme was amazing. It was warm and clear, this weather lasted throughout the run ( so no excuses there!)
As far as the eye could see above and below me were thousands of head lights.
When I arrived at the top I decided to hug the ‘lucky’ aid crew at the top of each peak (I remembered the first two and forgot all the rest).
With 30 minutes to go to Courmayer I met a man who’s batteries were flat and he followed me closely down the hill. At the bottom were 20 or so spectators all cheering “bravo! Bravo!”, I fell on my arse and slid the rest of the way down ….so typical.

Mistake No2 :No dry socks in my drop bag.

At this point I was leading my age group by miles but I had no idea and assumed I was doing really badly.
Dawn was breaking and Italian  Courmayer was a beautiful town, all cobbled streets and wonderful buildings.
Another steep slow climb up to Refuge Bertone.
Amazing amazing scenery, here is where I saw Mt Blanc for the first time in all her glory!

There were wonderful fir tree forests and alpine flowers, glaciers and huge scree slopes.
At every village I passed people were yelling “bravo! Bravo! allez! allez!” Really cool. The Italian toilets though were those stand and crouch thingies. My legs were sore and I was seriously worried about being able to get up again!
Climbing (slowly… sorry was still not over my climbing speed) up Grand col Ferret my feet began to hurt. When I descended into La Fouly they became extremely painful and pins and needlely. I broke my ‘ no sitting till it’s over’ rule and sat down. And the DNF word crossed my mind I was bloody tired and thought my progress was very slow.
But I  decided to ignore feet and hobble on to Champex-Lac where my marvelous friend Jennifer was waiting. We decided to get my feet checked out in the medical tent. They cheerfully injected iodine into the blisters. This was excruciatingly painful. I had an audience of young boys who thought it was all very entertaining!

FINISHED! Jean, 2nd in her age group.

Unfortunately this took a long time and I lost 1hr45. However at the time I was so lala I had no idea of this. But I was keen to carry on for another night. And I had Jennifer to look forward to in another 17K at Trient.

Mistake No3: care about your competition.

Except for a couple of stops to adjust foot bandages the second night was pretty neat.
I would think I was approaching an aid station but it would be a flock of cows with their bells ringing. One aid station gave me some fatty steak, thought I’d died and gone heaven! Jennifer was waiting at Trient and I must admit I had lost focus by now and was cruising along on a happy high confident that I would finish. My first place status completely forgotten! And the winner sneaked past me at the next aid station.
The last major climb up Tete aux vents began easily enough albeit with some hallucinations and then became very steep. Near the top there was no track and a lot of boulders to clamber over. It became quite misty and surreal. On the final down hill it gradually became light and I could just make out some incredible rock formations.
Being in no particular hurry!!! I stopped at La Flegere for some soup. The last 8k from here was all runnable. Once I told my sore legs who was boss I was able to get some reasonable speed up. This was lucky as there were a couple more old ladies in my age group very close behind !
And then it was Jennifer and I running though the streets of Chamonix. I mistimed my AWESOME finish sprint twice thinking it was the end, but finally made it, finishing 2nd veteran woman!
And my prize? Probably the only UTMB Cow Bell in NZ!!!

Vajin, in Chamonix on the eve before UTMB- he is pumped and ready t go!

UTMB – La Grande Finale…
A dear friend of mine, Sri Chinmoy, once said “Greatness is a matter of a moment. Goodness is the work of a lifetime”. In my time away I have seen again and again the truth of this statement. Our society today is quick to praise the great, the rich and the powerful but does little to celebrate the good, the generous, the self giving and the kind. Being here in Chamonix, seeing the thousands of runners  here ready to give their all, reminds me that although running is an individual sport, preparing for an ultra is a true team effort. Each person is here prepared to race, thanks not only to their own efforts in training, but also due to the sacrifices and love of their friends, family and loved ones.

For me the opportunity I have had to race here in Europe was the result of the generosity and kindness of my friends, family and sponsors. I would like to take this opportunity to offer my gratitude to all those that have helped to make this dream of mine a reality. One person in particular has gone above and beyond the call of duty and has really been the heart and soul of this tour. Prasasta, my wife deserves as much praise and credit for any results that I have achieved. It has only been thanks to her love, generosity and oneness that I have been able to race as well as I have.

Tomorrow I will be setting out on an epic trip around the big hill and I frankly couldn’t be more excited. UTMB has so much hype around it, I can’t wait to actually get underway and out onto the trails. Today was the race pack pick up and I was drug tested for the first time. I must have really made it to the big time now. Tomorrow we will be kicking it off at 4.30pm which is a couple of hours earlier than the usual start time. This is great as it gives us a good four hours of daylight to get into the race before we start the epic night. The weather forecast is good with highs in the low 20′s during the day dropping to 7 or 8 degrees overnight. So we should be all good to run the full course for the first time since 2009.

I hope to race smart and I realise that the race won’t really start until the sun rises on Saturday. I aim to go out at a solid but relaxed pace and aim to take really good care of myself throughout the night so I am ready to run hard when it matters. I am confident in my climbing and will be bringing my wizard sticks to help me save something for the final three climbs. I know there are a whole lot of big names here but I am focusing on just running to my potential. I also know if I run strong the whole way and put in a performance that I can be proud of, I am sure I will be in the mix. This race always goes out way to fast so expect me to start back in the field and move my way through.

Follow the race via BCR, UTMB website and all other reputable trail sources.
My bib number is 2211
Ciao,
Vajin
Thank you to my sponsors Ultimate Direction, Macpac, Saucony, Buff, Injinji, Zensah.

UTMB Live Tracking, including live TV stream- HERE

iRunFar live UTMB updates HERE

BCR hopes to share updates on Vajin’s progress from emails his wife, Prasasta, sends us. We will updates on our Twitter and/or Facebook pages.