Luang Prabang Ultra Trail 30k – 2023 Edition

A long-awaited trail race for me, having DNS for the X Race in August. I had 2 x 12-week training blocks under my belt since my 50k in June. I was expecting a tough race, and I changed up my training after the 50k where I found I was road-ready but not mountain-ready.

Shuttle service from downtown to the start/finish area on Saturday revealed a boggy marshalling area. Somewhat foreboding for the state of the course. I watched the start of the 55k, and noticed some of the guys who did the course marking were the only ones with long sleeves and covered legs. There were no gear checks, I watched runners burdened with all the ‘mandatory’ gear eyeing off the other runners with much smaller lighter packs and then unloading some of their extra stuff. I tried to imagine setting off at 12 midday in the hottest part of the day, prepared to spend all night on the trail.

The 30k race starts at 4 am which meant an early start on the shuttle again around 3 am.

From the start, it was quick down the road and through the village. We met Florian 100m from the finish on his 55km (16 hours in). Well done on 5th place!

A ladder created a bottleneck allowing only single file. Followed by the first uphill section. I figured about 20 people ran off ahead while I joined the hiking pack. Out of the village, the gradient was extreme, there wasn’t an existing trail just a scramble, straight up the slope. This is the terrain I really struggle with, slippery and too steep of an angle compared to my ankle flexibility makes it hard to plant my whole foot. This was where poles would have really helped. I let people behind pass me, making sure I didn’t redline so I could keep enough in the tank for the rest of the race and knowing I was quicker on the down hills. The trail was treacherous and slippery, when it wasn’t straight up it was cross slope where you still had to be sure of every step. If you slipped down slope I’m not sure how long it would take to stop.

Pretty soon I found myself mostly alone, occasionally I would get a glimpse of the group ahead that ran off from the start but never catching up to them. I caught up to one guy and ran just behind him for a bit. Having a runner in front gives me confidence to run as well. Eventually, we slowed and he showed me he was using his phone light. So, I offered him my spare headlight and went off ahead. The downhill was in low bamboo forest so I was crouched for a lot of the time. Once we came out of the jungle and on to a dirt track, I caught some other runners on the way to the first aid station.

A quick stop to refill my water and eat a cookie, got my spare headlight returned, gained a place or 2 at the aid station, the next section was back on to the road. It got light while running through the fields and I put away my headlight, only a few minutes later the trail plunged back into the still very dark bamboo forest. There was a runner ahead so I didn’t get my headlight out again and just continued in the low light. I should have got my light back out. More step slippery uphill. I picked up a piece of bamboo as a trekking pole which was remarkably helpful. Onto some nice single track through the brambles, Mimosa pudica, along a saddle and then a more nasty cross slope. Unfortunately, the views were obscured by fog. Ended up with lots of thorns in my hands trying to stop myself slipping and clearing branches from in front of my face.

Next section was a scramble up a stream bed, with sharp limestone boulders. The runner in front lost her way and I went past. Coming over the top and down the other side, again the downhill was treacherous and not suitable for running. I picked up another runner that was ahead of me, again not sure of the way to go. We descended together, it was a single track but we didn’t see any trail markers for a few hundred metres. We were overtaken by a guy that must have been flying down the hill. Out of the forest, we crossed some rice fields, there was no avoiding the water and mud. The other side of the field was a village and the next aid station, quick water refill and ate some of my own food. I was very surprised to see one guy sit down with a bowl of egg palo and rice with only 11km to go.

More road running, the usual with me slower on the uphill and faster on the down hills. Back onto a trail along a ridge line with a spectacular view. Stopped for a selfie.

Back into the bamboo forest. I managed to lose the trail briefly after missing a turn. I got left behind on an uphill road section by the 2 that I was running with. they were encouraging me to run with them but I knew my redline and let them pull away up the hill and joined them again going back down. We then dropped down into nam dong park.  Across a rope bridge and down along the waterfall. Lots of photographers stationed through this section, one got me slipping over but somewhat disappointingly he didn’t publish those photos.  More confusion about the direction, was quickly resolved with several of us working together. Across an aqueduct and back into roads.

Finally, we joined up with all the other distances on the ‘finisher’ hill, super steep up with 18 and 8 km runners littering the slope. Knowing it was the last climb and only a few km to go, I knew now was the time to push the redline up the hill and was able to leave behind the other 2 runners that I’d been with for the last 6 km. the back side of this hill was quite dangerous. The only way I could get down was on all fours. Again, lots of shorter-distance runners to get past slowed things down a bit. Past that, there was a nice section of single track, generally downhill and I was again mostly alone. I was able to run a lot of it. 1 km to go was on the slope above the start-finish area so I could party from the trail which is always good motivation for that last little bit. Popping out again in the village, it was a last few hundred meters back to the finish line in 5:28:32. The volunteer handing out the medals and shirts was looking for a top 5 lanyard to give me but 5^th place had just gone through a couple of minutes ahead of me.

Check the official results here: https://my.raceresult.com/263865/#2_9C3718