Ultra Fiord
Into The Fortress: The 70km Race
Anne-Marie Dunhill / 11.04.2017
The 70km distance of the Ultra Fiord race started on April 7 at 08:10 from the Hotel Rio Serrano. Temperatures had dropped below freezing overnight and as the racers had done for the start of the 50 km distance, the runners remained until the very last minute in the warmth of the hotel lobby before affronting the elements. The mood in the hotel lobby was one of tense anticipation.
As the sun was rising, a low lying fog rose from the nearby river; wisps of grayish air blending with the crisp white frozen ground with the rising sun dusting the peaks above the fog with a subtle pink hue. I felt intense exasperation; before coming to cover the race I’d reread my race reports from my 2015 coverage of the inaugural edition of the Ultra Fiord race. I’d spoken of a magical land of fairies and trolls and chided myself afterwards, telling myself it was just a race in a beautiful place, not a parallel reality. However at that precise moment I thought uh-oh, here we go again, as the magic of Patagonia took hold of the senses that were desperately attempting to remain Cartesian whilst assimilating the vast beauty and frankly failing.
The 70 km distances takes runners through the jewel in the crown of the race, the “Fortress”. The Fortress is a route through the Chacabuco range that the race director, Stjepan Pavicic, traced in 2014 using his background as a professional geologist. His team opened the route working several months in 2014 and 2015. Runners going through this part of the race are literally treading on virgin territory. There are no words to describe the glacier crossing, rock scrambling and boulder fields of this section.
Photos show tiny colorful specks sprinkled along a vast white space; runners advancing across the glacier with bright blue ice indicating crevasses on either side of their carefully marked path.
The majority of the race resources were concentrated on this critical section for the 70km, 100km and 100miles distances. Of the 12 people present in this section after racers exited from Hosteria Balmaceda, from the PC in Chacabuco 1, over the highest point of Paso Byron (1240m) to the PC in Camp El Salto, there were professional mountain guides, men with WFR training (wilderness first responder) as well as the race director and Jordi Tosas who was present on this edition as the technical director for this section. All had communication devices. New this year was also a helicopter stationed on a helipad in Serrano with a flight time of 6-7 minutes access to the Fortress.
Racers from the three distances invariably remarked how safe they had perceived themselves to be on this section. Everyone I spoke to acknowledged that they knew the section was dangerous and difficult because of the terrain but that there were people at different points giving them instructions on exactly what to; instructions such as to stay exactly on the marked path as there were crevasses on either side.
Australian based runner, Cécile Laurent, who was the third woman on the 70 km said after the race that she and her companion Chris Smith had never run on ice before. She said that at one point her right leg slipped through the snow up to her hip and that she was surprised to see Jordi Tosas run down to where she was to assist. She added that she didn’t know who he was at the time, they’d “Just seen some guy sitting like a Buddha on a rock above us.”
Changes in the glacier meant that the race had to install a rope for runners to descend one portion and a runner described it to me as “an abseil with no harness.” Again a member of race staff was positioned here; ensuring that runners descended one by one. The warm sunny weather meant that rocks were dislodged and Ragna Debats who won the 70 km described waiting 8 minutes for her turn to descend with rocks crashing around them. The wait clearly frustrated the race leaders.
The 70 km race finished in Estancia Perales that had also been the finishing line of the 2016 edition of the Patagonian Expedition Race. The first three men were Pere Aurell, Roger Vinas and Genis Zapater. The first three women were Ragna Debatz, Veronica Bravo and Cécile Laurent. The prize giving took place at the finish line.
Talking to Ragna Debats on the lawns of Estancia Perales about her impressions, she said, “ It’s a very tough race, very wild, not a race like the ones we’re used to in Europe, it’s a lot wilder with the river crossings, the turba and the non-stop up and down. The last 20km were hard with the turba, it took longer than expected.” She added that she was happy to be finally able to run the last 4km into Perales.
To put her words and her notion of “tough” into context, as I’m writing this report, a Janis Joplin song just came on downstairs in the hostel where I’m writing in Puerto Natales. “But I'm gonna show you, baby, that a woman can be tough...” Ragna is as tough as they come. Before the race start, the first time we saw her she was coming off the bus pulling her heavy bag, nursing her infant son. She’s married to Pere Aurell, so the 70km podium was special this year with a husband and wife duo on the top places.
Second place winner Roger Vinas Vilardell from Catalonia Spain had a dazed expression as he crossed the finish line saying, “It’s a dream, it’s very difficult to explain the race because my brain can’t process all the images and scenery. It was difficult, a very hard race and I’m happy to finish Ultra Fiord.” He then proceeded to take out his pocket camera and go through the images as if to begin integrating his experience.
The 50km distance and 70km had finished but the 100 km and 100miles were still going on and there are more stories to be told...
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