Sri Lanka RTP Race Report Part III: From the Central Highlands to the Indian Ocean

Day-by-Day Race Report

Day 1, Central Highlands of Nuwara Eliya. 37.5 km
Checkpoint 1: 12.2km, Checkpoint 2: 8.1 km, Checkpoint 3: 10.5 km, Checkpoint 4: 6.6km
Altitude: starting at 1,790m, finishing at 1,703m; Elevation loss: 1,502m, Elevation Gain: 1,088m

Arzoo struggling up a steep tea ascent

This first day of our race was a total shocker, with two of four stages marked as “extremely difficult” (when almost the entire rest of the 250km was considered “moderate,” ha!). When we left the scout camp and the safety of our wooden shacks at 8a.m., I thought our biggest problem would be leeches or the fact that a monkey had stolen my snack bar for the day. Down came the hammer almost immediately with a 10km track through the jungle - over entangled roots, under fallen trees, up, up, up, and more up. I almost impaled my behind on nasty tree branches on at least four occasions... Finally, I thought things were looking up (no pun intended) when we got out of the jungle and into tea country, but the following 2.2km climb was even more brutal. By the time we reached Checkpoint 1 at the top of a road, I was ready to call it quits. But of course it would have looked a bit silly to come all of this way only to quit this early in the game. I did growl a bit though. Or maybe I growled a lot. 

The following 8.1 km to checkpoint 2 were okay, I guess - along a winding road where the biggest excitement was the appearance of a bunch of cheeky local boys who took pleasure in emptying buckets of water over our heads from a bridge. We were also pleased to find ourselves in a Muslim majority part of the country, so Arzoo, Kubra and Mahdi were frequently greeted with an enthusiastic “Salaam Aleikum!” and we even went for a prayer-and pee-break at a local mosque - how many visitors from Afghanistan might they have had before, I wonder?! 

Stage 1 - Arriving at Camp

Then stage 3 - another 10.5km along a local train track, past Ambewele Train Station to Ohiya, trying to figure out whether to walk on the tracks or off the tracks, how to navigate a frightfully high train bridge without looking down, trying not to think about oncoming trains when going through a train tunnel, and humming along to Cynthia's Billy Joel tape. Not to forget having to navigate another part of the jungle - this one so thick that course director Carlos Garcia Prieto and his team had had to clear a path with machetes. 

Our biggest team disappointment came at checkpoint 3, where Team Sahra member Kubra was pulled out of the race because of a condition that wouldn't allow her to go on. She took this defeat as gracefully as one can, but more about that later.

Stage 1 - Overnight in an abandoned tea factory

All in all, we climbed 1088m and descended 1502m today, on a course which we were told was unexpectedly tough not just for ultra rookies. We got to camp just before night fall, walking across the finish line as a team, despite our pain and tears, with Arzoo, Mahdi, and Kubra insisting to join for the final meters. Reflections of the day? A devastated Kubra found it in herself to say this: "It doesn't matter if I stopped it, the main point was giving it a try. And I did. I will do a future marathon - with my daughter." Way to go, Kubra!

Instead of huts or tents, we were put up on the third floor of an abandoned tea factory, all 80 of us. Group snoring and farting and sore legs apart, I slept like a log, totally wiped out by 8p.m.. Little did I know that this would be the last night that I would sleep uninterrupted, dry and happy...


Day 2, Tea Plantations. 39 km
Checkpoint 1: 10.5km, Checkpoint 2: 11.1 km, Checkpoint 3: 9.7 km, Checkpoint 4: 7.8km
Altitude: starting at 1,790m, finishing at 545; Elevation loss: 2,157m, Elevation Gain: 998m

The morning start at the Tea Factory

The course notes had announced that today would be "mainly downhill," so I was a little miffed when the day started with quite a significant climb up a mountain road. Nothing like unannounced pain that you weren't mentally prepared for! But it's  true that the day would see us descending from the tea plantations at 1,703m above sea level to the pre-jungle stage at 545m. With a gross elevation loss of 2,157m, there was indeed a lot of downhill, in fact, much more than I had bargained for! After the first initial climb, Belinda and I found ourselves having to chase our Afghan team-mates Arzoo and Mahdi, who had taken off at unexpected speed and just flew down the mountain. I was trying so hard to keep up and struggling with the unexpected feeling of actually running that I only managed a passing glimpse and nod of appreciation at the Bambarakanda, at 265m Sri Lanka's tallest waterfall, before we came to Checkpoint 1 after some rather intense 10.5km.  

With Arzoo and Mahdi

The horror continued with more uphills. Turns out that we manoevred an elevation gain of 998m throughout the day, all packed into a few nasty hills that tested every fibre of my willpower. Coming unannounced, they were that much worse, although it allowed me to catch up with our team mates and finally demonstrate some "mentor qualities" by using rather strong language to "beat" them up that mountain, to our second checkpoint after another 11.1km. I believe my team mates may have told me they 'hated' me more than a few times! Team humour at a low point at this stage...

For checkpoints 3 (after 9.7km) and 4 (after 7.8km), we saw a lot more village life. After yesterday’s experience in the mosque, today we saw Hindu temples and Buddhist stupas, reminding us of Sri Lanka's multi-religious make-up. In fact, I got to see more of the Hindu temple than I had bargained for, having to navigate a looooong set of garishly painted stairs that made my legs scream. 

Day 2 Camp

Descending through farmland and small villages, we came across scores of school children on their way home, who bumbled along like mountain goats, making me feel very unfit indeed. On a different note, the villagey character of today made it much harder to find appropriate toilet stops, to which one unnamed member of our team can attest! ;)

Kubra spent the day with the Racing the Planet volunteers, seeing a wholly different side of this operation, no less challenging than the actual running. It was wonderful to see her smiling face at the end of a long day, and to have her attend to us like royalty once we got back to camp - a kingdom for a cup of oatmeal! Arzoo's comment of the day: "It was very hard, I almost quit. I got lots of blisters. My legs are hurting." Yep, that sums it up perfectly.

I spent some time with the medics today, even though my feet are holding up much better than I had feared. I have four small blisters, but one is under my toenail and had to be drained. I'm much more concerned about the sunburn on my hands and legs, which is beginning to blow bubbles. Will have to watch those. And toilet visits are beginning to become a bit of a problem - as a true Stiff-Schneider, I am finding it hard to squat at the best of times, but now those much needed procedures at the end of a long day running have become a grimace-inducing exercise.

Nightfall found us on the grounds of a small rural school, where the organizers had put up open air tents. It was nice to have a fresh breeze comforting us all night, watch the starlit sky. Except half-way through the night, the winds got so strong, one of the tents actually got lifted up and flew away! Not that I had been sleeping deeply at this stage anyway - yes, my legs were definitely hurting a LOT by this stage!

Day 3, Jungle, Rice Paddies, Buddhas and Elephants. 45 km
Checkpoint 1: 12.3km, Checkpoint 2: 9.6 km, Checkpoint 3: 12.3 km, Checkpoint 4: 9.5km 
Altitude: starting at 545m, finishing at 158m; Elevation loss: 1,152m, Elevation Gain: 759m

Last one to leave the camp!

As I had taken a bit longer this morning to tie up my shoe laces (no doubt clinging on to the last few moments of limited pain), I was abandoned by my team before I had even crossed the starting line, and ended up at the back of the pack for a while - embracing it with joy, though! ;)
Nature-wise, this was definitely the most beautiful day of the week.

Whilst there wasn’t quite as much climbing and descending as in the last two days (but still a lot more than I would have liked), today our challenge was to survive the extreme heat and humidity of the low lands. The course was technically challenging to say the least - the first two legs were thick jungle full of mud, roots, and thick brush, and some river crossings. After checkpoint 2, there was what I thought to be the most beautiful scenery of the entire race (of which, sadly, I haven't seen a single picture) - navigating the thin rims of watered rice paddies, cheered on by local farmers.

The Buduruwagala Rock Carvings

At this stage I had caught up with Belinda and my favourite Afghans, who were in an even grumpier mood than me when I told them we had to speed up to make the cut-off time (yes! even though nobody had even wasted a thought on cut-off times in the first two days, we were told that from now on they would be strictly enforced. Not so good that I didn't have a watch...). So when we came out of the jungle to find ourselves in front of Sri Lanka's largest standing Buddha statute (16m) in Buduruwagala, thought to date from the 10th century, we only managed a fleeting glance (in fact, I saw reports that, since the destruction of the Bamyan Buddhas by the Taliban, this is now the tallest standing Buddha in the world).  This was actually kind of what happened to us throughout the week: as we were always racing against the clock, no time could ever be wasted on things like photos, and food would always be consumed on the go. I must admit that I did usually drop down like a sack of potatoes when I reached one of the checkpoints, to refill my bottles and hydration pills (*read: have them refilled by the wonderful volunteers!*), gulp down a Clif bar, and to steal a rare moment of rest. But as the days went on, and my feet got more and more swollen, I quickly regretted those stops, as my legs would seize up, and standing up again to start walking would become an exercise in agony.

Our beautiful tent city by the lake

One part of our race led us through elephant territory, and we found ourselves protected by armed representatives of the Sri Lankan Wildlife Commission. I must admit that I felt more than a little uneasy when we found large droppings in the tall grass that we had to fight our way through, but we never did spot that elephant, which those who were faster than us had apparently seen earlier in the day. 

We had a moment of shock when we thought that we had, indeed, missed the cut-off time for checkpoint 3 by five (!) minutes, but as this would have disqualified half of the field of competitors, we were allowed to go on if we would make it to camp before night fall. So here we were, suddenly inspired to unseen heights of performance - yes, I was racing down village asphalt roads steaming with humidity like I was being chased by that elusive elephant. (In reality, I was probably still waddling at a turtle-like pace with a comical, stork-like gait.) Incidentally, under the original course set-up, days 2 and 3 would have amounted to the traditional "long march," i.e. we would have had to do 80km in one go, and keep going throughout the night. The reason this was changed is because the Wildlife Commission did not approve night-time walking in light of the potential wildlife activity in the area and - honestly? Thank be to god. There is no way I would have made this in the dark...

But yes, as things stood, we did make it, just in time for sunset, into a magnificent tent city set up by the side of a lake. Absolutely stunning and gorgeous, and definitely a reward for my aching limbs. Although I did spend quite a lot of time in the medical tent that evening having my blisters attended to...

Day 4, Buttala March. 46 km
Checkpoint 1: 10.2km, Checkpoint 2: 8.9 km, Checkpoint 3: 10 km, Checkpoint 4: 8.5km, Checkpoint 5: 8.3km
Altitude: starting at 135m, finishing at 127m; Elevation loss: 1,152m, Elevation Gain: 759m
 

Cane Fields

Today we saw a lot of drop-outs across the competitor field - soles literally peeling off from feet due to the humidity, nausea, hip injuries... It was also, no doubt, the hardest day of the week for me. Or maybe it was just the first in several really, really hard days....? I NEVER thought I would ever be caught saying that I preferred uphills to downhills, but the descents of the last two days absolutely killed me - I found that I could barely walk other than in some bizarre stork-like way, relying on my poles as crutches. Plus, it turned out that I should have bought my pair of shoes an extra size up after all (in addition to the extra size I already use for running shoes), as my feet had started to swell up beyond recognition. 

Team Sahra: Mahdi and Arzoo
with Connie and Belinda

Once again, we were facing relentless heat and humidity, and a course that led us through sugar cane fields, river crossings and canals. Whilst I enjoyed the country side to begin with, honestly, there is only so much sugar cane that I really want to see, and as you run/walk/hobble along row after row of cane, I think I must have reached my limit for life. 

Teamwork in action

After barely missing the cut-off yesterday, Arzoo and Mahdi were not to be stopped. The complaining and "hate yous" had completely stopped, and instead they just doggedly trudged on, facing the pain and boredom of the track. A word on team work here: this race was all meant to be about Afghan Team Sahra, and the internationals (Belinda, Cynthia, Karen, me) "merely" meant to mentor and support them. In my case, of course, it's a bit of a stretch that I could mentor and support as I had never done a race before and sometimes had difficulties keeping up. Karen found it hard to slow down to our speed and instead took up the role of 'camp mum' who helped the late arrivals and had a few chats on eating right when needed. Cynthia was Mother Turtle - always there, always reliable, with a Hermione Granger miracle pack full of goodies and water-proof tarp that came in handy in our hours of greatest need, and endless words of wisdom, and Belinda was the person who graciously gave up on her ability to run a much faster race and just "stuck" to the Afghan team when needed. Her ability to laugh at herself and the absurdity of many situations we found ourselves in was what really made me pull through. As for me, I think I pulled my weight when I managed to 'motivate' our Team up the hills on days 1 and 2 and to the third checkpoint on day 3, but I won't lie - it's difficult to project energy on other people when you need to be spending so much time on yourself. I was a little bit upset that the team didn't stick together when I was struggling with my swollen feet, but this all provided important input on discussions about team work. Ultimately, I learned so much - about me, about others, about my limits and about ... life, I guess?

Those sugar cane fields just went on, and on, and on and on (did I mention that already?!), like a labyrinth to which there was no end. I had downloaded tons of audio books onto my iPod shuffle (remember those?! yes, great if you are trying not to use up a lot of battery), but as it turns out, it's hard to concentrate out there. Haruki Murakami's iconic "What I talk about when I talk about running" really annoyed me as I was waddling along, trying not to think about running at all. So in the end, it was mainly music, lots of chit-chats with Belinda and Cynthia, and some very bad singing when I found myself on my own. No life-changing insights, I'm afraid. The highlight of the day was a thigh-deep river crossing right before Checkpoint 2, where all of us contemplated a refreshing bath, but in the end just bit our teeth and limited ourselves to changing into a pair of fresh socks. 

The excitement of the river crossing was followed by a stretch of asphalt road and winding village roads, and eventually gave in to a long drawn-out path by the side of a canal, where we saw locals washing and swimming, before we finally got to Camp. 


We spent the night at Dematamal Viharaya Temple, a Buddhist site with its own statue. Whilst that sounded romantic and picture-perfect, it turned out that real life was nothing like the brochure! ;) We got to the site late, it was basically getting dark already, and it started raining almost as soon as we got in, making it impossible to enjoy dinner, making it challenging to see the docs, and making it really inconvenient to move around the camp (remember: at this stage, I can barely walk! So anything that required more attention than putting one foot in front of the other, compounded my misery multi-fold). It also turned out to be the night we got flooded for the first time. Oh the misery! I actually found this one of the toughest moments of the race - to find your tent not fully water proof, slowly flooding with water, and everybody too tired to move or wrap things up. Oh the misery!
 


Day 5, Elephant Alley. 30 km
Checkpoint 1: 10.3km, Checkpoint 2: 10.3 km, Checkpoint 3: 9.4 km
Altitude: starting at 127m, finishing at 19m; Elevation loss: 279m, Elevation Gain: 334m

The morning after...

Rain, Rain, Rain

We got rained on a LOT today. 
Today was a "short" day, 30km only, three checkpoints only, but I was not a happy camper. Starting with waking up in a puddle and having to put on wet clothes and wet shoes, my feet ballooned up and aching, too wet to apply plasters to my blisters. 

The initial stage took us back the same canals we had ploughed along the previous night, only it was raining cats and dogs the entire time. After I had initially brought out my rain jacket, I quickly realised there was little point - everything was wet, wet, wet. At least the rain was warm and interspersed with bouts of sunshine that would dry us quickly and make us wish for more rain. 

Trudging on thanks to Olivia

Team Sahra ditched me and my increasingly expanding feet and blisters for most of today, but with the help of the spirited Olivia and the one and only Cynthia, I trudged on, somehow. Cynthia ingeniously re-manufactured my compression sleeves and long socks, protecting my various sunburns. I must admit, I was feeling very sorry for myself! 

This was also the day I finally caught a whiff of myself. I had previously wondered why we didn't smell anywhere near as bad as I had feared after days of not washing, until somebody pointed out that it was merely my nose being accustomed to the smell. But on this day 5, the wind suddenly turned, and as I looked around trying to figure out who around me had produced this terrible stench, it hit me that it was my very own smell that nearly made me gag. Not a high point of my race experience, I can tell you!  

Our campsite in the Park

We crossed a hanging bridge and a number of smaller rivers today, and spent the last 1.5km being escorted by a car (for protection against the wildlife) walking into Yala National Park, Sri Lanka's most visited and second largest national park, where we spent the night inside a park compound. It was here that one of my fellow German runners asked me why I had my shoelaces so tightly wound up if I could barely walk. This was one of those moments of epiphany - swollen feet means untie shoelaces, right. Doh! I felt a whole lot better after that!  

Day 6, Crossing Yala. 50 km
Checkpoint 1: 9km, Checkpoint 2: 8 km, Checkpoint 3: 6.7 km, Checkpoint 4: 7.2km, Checkpoint 5: 21.5km
Altitude: starting at 19m, finishing at 1; Elevation loss: 639m, Elevation Gain: 361m

Day 6, our longest, but not our hardest day - it's astonishing what anticipation of the end of misery can do! 

Day 6, the day I finally discovered the effects of painkillers. In the morning, fellow runners Uwe and Magda gave me their last 600mg Ibuprofen pill, promising that it would help get me back on my feet. And that's literally what it did. Today we had to run for 31km to checkpoint 4, at which stage the clocks would be stopped and runners would have to cross the last 20km of Yala National Park in groups, followed by park vehicles, for protection.  17km of road, followed by 14km of jungle path way, and another river crossing. And to my utter amazement, I actually managed to run most of the first stage - finally realising that it's much easier to get it over with faster and get out of that heat, rather than suffer on slowly!

Day 6, the day I broke down in uncontrollable sobs, after 15km of running in the relentless heat on a horribly long stretch of road. So many of my fellow runners had talked about crying whilst out on the course on their own, that I thought I might as well try it for something to do, and once I had started, I found I couldn't stop! I cried and cried and cried, for myself, longing for my family, thinking about my feet and the state of the world, and it just wouldn't go away. The wonderful superhuman Carlos gave me a hug at just the right moment, giving me the strength to go on in the midst of all that emotion!

Day 6, km 30, when I finally took the only logical conclusion and cut my shoes (had my shoes cut) into pieces so that my swollen feet would be able to breathe again. Ah, the pleasure of receding pain!

Tentmates after surviving the last night

Day 6, when we finally entered the Park, with its incredible amount of wildlife including elephants, wild water buffalos, various species of birds, deer, wild boars and sloth bears. We didn't actually get to see anything whilst walking through the Park, but it was a nice thought. Kubra, after volunteering all week, had joined our team at Checkpoint 4 and was eager to walk the final stage with us, bringing Team Sahra's journey to a great conclusion. Actually, our group was quite a pitiful affair, and I was probably one of the main culprits. At this stage, with the time pressure gone, and so few kilometres left, I found it very hard to motivate myself. I only have hazy memories of how we made it to the campsite on the beach... essentially the end of our trip (with a mere ceremonial 2km left for the next day)!

But honestly, not so fast. Whilst I loved the campsite at the Ocean, I was at this stage so exhausted and fed up with my own smell, I just wanted to go home. For good measure, we got flooded again in our tents that night, so as I got up on Day 7, I just couldn't wait for it all to be over.


Day 7, Final Footsteps to the Indian Ocean. 2.5 km

I did WHAT?

Waking up on what should have been one of my happiest days in recent memory, I looked around me to find that everything, but literally everything in our tent was wet. I had thrown away my last food items the day before, so I literally had nothing left to eat, and the smell at this stage was close to unbearable. "Never again!" was the mantra in our tent that morning, although repeat offenders in my team warned me that I was likely to forget all of the pain as soon as I had enjoyed my shower.

Coming to the finish line in a tumble

So off we went for our final two kilometers down the beach into a local fishing village! Some of us more excited than others, me hobbling along, thinking about things I would do differently next time - according to Belinda, the sure tell-tale sign that I'll be back! ;) Things I would do differently? Bigger shoes. Less food. Exchange my Swiss cheese air mattress for a good, old Therm-A-Rest. At night, keep my clothes in the water-tight bag they belong in. Tape my feet every morning before blisters form. Download only easily digestible audiobooks and more 80s music. Take industrial-sized Ibuprofen before the pain becomes unbearable. Train more beforehand. Have the courage to run more, walk less.

At the finish line, I didn't feel particularly elated, I just felt tired and happy that I survived. Literally survived! I came 58 out of 61 finishers (whoohoo) out of an original 81 competitors, with probably a bit of extra time in there due to attending to team priorities. Given that I hadn't started training until about six weeks before the race and hadn't planned on running at all, I thought the fact that I finished in more or less one piece and actually did some running was a fair feat. Or maybe it just proves, after all, that it (= finishing at the back of the pack) is not about running and training so much as about pigheadedness and refusal to give in. I could never ever ever have done it without Belinda and Cynthia - and the doctors who popped my blisters, and the kind people who gave me ibuprofen and cut my shoes and Checkpoint captain Tony whom I had to prove wrong, and of course Arzoo, Kubra and Mahdi, who gave me the courage to sign up in the first place.
Did I feel proud? Honestly, I think I was too exhausted at that stage. Would I do it again? Absolutely!



* All photos (c) Mike Hermsmeyer for Racing the Planet

Remember, you can still support the fundraising drive for Team Sahra's expenses.
Their race entries were sponsored by the generous guys at Racing The Planet, but Free to Run has to cover their flight costs, some gear that could not be borrowed, training costs...
https://www.crowdrise.com/teamsahra - 
Every bit helps Free to Run to make these kind of life-changing experiences possible, and to create an incredible multiplier effect back in Afghanistan!