After running the Solang Sky Ultra 60 km last year, I decided that I will not participate in this race in 2024. Reason being, it is too technical, has huge elevation gain and most importantly it has high altitude. For a city guy with a kid, taking care of these many things is a difficult task, training gets too complicated. I do have idea of technical trails, so running a race is not that difficult. But training for a race with high elevation at a high-altitude place! I was not willing to go for it. That is why I was trying to search an event which atleast did not have high altitude. Elevation and technicality could be taken care of.
That is why, in January 2024 while trying to finalize my running calendar for the year, I could find two races, both organized by WGRF. There are others too, in the southern part of India, but because of the accessibility issue and some family constraints, I zeroed down these two events. One in July and another in December. But I needed one more in between these two races.
After running a successful race in June, Sinhagad Epic Trail, 21 Km, I discussed with my coach and finalized Solang Sky Ultra 30 KM in October. There was one more race in Gujrat but that did not have “enough elevation”, and my training was more focused towards high elevation and hiking with easy running.
Training For Solang Sky Ultra – 30 Km
A 30 KM race with 2000m elevation at an altitude of more than 2600m is a lot, especially for a person who lives and trains in the plain roads of a city. An event like this demands 4 things in training, elevation gain, strength, mileage and acclimatization.
Elevation
In cities, only option to gain the elevation is either stair master in the gym or stairs of a high-rise building. I had the second option available. In a week, I included two 90 minutes sessions of stairs, with 5-10 kg weight in my back pack. This used to be a Zone 1 and Zone 2 effort. Sounds boring? I know, but it is what it is. I was accumulating almost 1000m elevation gain in a week.
Strength Training
Strength training for any event should be as specific as possible. Apart from the general strength training, I was spending close to 2 hours per week for trail specific strength training. This primarily included plyometrics and Box step ups with additional weight of 5-10% body weight. Along with this, I also focused on single leg balancing exercises. Every fourth week, I used to do Yoga asanas to relax the muscles.
Mileage
My mileage used to be in between 60 – 95 KM with 80-85 % in Zone 1 and Zone 2. This mileage does not include the two 90 minutes sessions of stairs. For high intensity sessions, I included the shorter duration repeats and gradually moved to 1Km repeats in Z3. During the last month of the training, I included progressive runs and fartleks too. During this time, my Zone 1 and Zone 2 workouts were reduced to around 60-65% of total mileage and Zone 3 and above workouts took their place. With all the mileage and strength training, I trained 10 to 14 hours per week.
Acclimatization
To acclimatize, I got the opportunity to travel to Manali and Spiti Valley, thanks to my family for allowing me to travel and my friend Mr Gulbir for coming up with the idea. We both planned to participate in the Spiti Marathon, which was happening one week prior to Solang Sky Ultra, in order to acclimatize well. The last two weeks were planned to get used to trails and to make the body ready for high altitude challenge. In the first week, we both covered few trail sections of the race, travelled to Sumdo and covered Kaza and Tabo in between. On Sunday I ran Spiti HM as my last long run. With all the elevation and altitude, I ran the race in Z2-Z3 and Z4 but overall, I felt strong. During the race week, we went on route recce and covered the Beas Kund section on Tuesday. After that we did few Zone 1 runs with pick ups to keep the body sharp and ready for the race.
The Often Ignored Thing
Apart from these four things, one more aspect went really good in the final 2 weeks. The daily nutrition and mental peace. These are often neglected, especially when we reach the place few days prior to the race. Our regular routine breaks, we often do not get proper food at the new place and either office or the change in weather keeps bothering us. Last year this was one of the major reasons why I could not execute my race well.
This year however, last two weeks before the race went perfect. I could not have asked for anything better. We stayed at Wood Stone Homestay in Old Manali, the owner, Mr Omi used to cook fresh food. All of us who stayed there got home like food. I religiously followed my diet by keeping alarm to eat whatever I had to eat right from the morning till I went to bed. Even when we travelled to Spiti, we got good food and stayed in comfortable places, including the army barracks where we spent 2 days and ate food in the Army canteen.
Now that the training period has come to an end, it was time to execute the race.
Race Day
I started my day with overnight soaked almonds and munakka. Ate boiled potato and one chapati, 2 hours before the race start time. We reached the venue 1 hour before the race flag off, warmed up and stood at the start line. I had few sips of RedBull as I knew it was going to be a fast start.
As soon as the race started, Arun went ahead and I followed him. First 2.5 KMs were complete uphill, I controlled my effort and kept running at a slower pace. At 2.5 KM mark, we took a u turn and started flying down. As soon as we hit the road again, the gradual and never ending uphill started. After covering initial 1.5 km on soft trail the next 4 KMs were on the road. Theses initial approximately 10 KMs, till the Dhundi Bridge, were our chance to save as much time as possible. From Dhundi bridge, the climb became steeper and running became speed hiking.
Target in Sight
When I reached the second aid station at Palchani Nalla, I saw Arun far ahead of me. I calculated that he was around 7 mins ahead of me. I did not waste much time at the aid station and continued. My plan was to either catch him or at least reduce the gap as much as possible. But on the contrary despite my best efforts the gap was increasing continuously. He was too fast for me to catch. Few runners from 60 and 100Km category told me that the gap has grown to 20 – 25mins.
After some time, I stopped thinking about catching him and focused on my next step. The hustle continued and I reached the Bakkarthach, then the Boulder section and finally started descending towards the river crossing. This downhill gave me a breather and I picked up some pace, crossed the river and started towards the most talked about climb of the race, The Lady Leg.
As I was approaching the Beas Kund Aid station, I saw Arun half way through the Lady Leg section. I realized that he was around 15 mins ahead of me. I said to myself, this is the time to cover up the gap. I decided to push through this hiking section and quickly start the downhill which is my favorite and kind of strong part. I hiked up as fast as I could. With all the history with the Lady Leg, I had to cover it fast. I eventually reached at the top and started the descent.
The Final Chase and the Accident
I started descending as fast as I could, I was confident that I will close the gap with Arun and there will be a good competition towards the end. While coming down I could feel a sensation in my calves, which was an indication to slow down. I however did not pay much attention to it and continued without provoking the sensation.
After crossing the river one last time, there is a good runnable section. It is a technical section, but it feels good to flow through the rocks on a narrow trail. While coming down from there, I got disbalanced, couldn’t control my pace and was about to fall towards the valley. I somehow managed to push from my right leg and forced myself to fall towards my left. The fall was brutal, on a bad day it could have been fatal, but thanks to the almighty that I was safe. Except for some bruises on my left leg, elbow and side abdomen, I was fine. I stood up, gathered myself and started running again. I threw the thought of catching Arun away and focused only on my next step.
Final Stretch and the Push
I reached the last aid station, and continued without stopping there. Next two KMs were on the rocky section, I was taking long steps, kind of jumping from one rock to another. This aggravated the muscles and I could feel that cramps could hit any moment now. Thanks to RedBull, which kept the cramps away. With just one sip I could run 1 km comfortably. This one sip for 1 km continued till the very end of the race.
The next 3 KMs were on the road. I maintained a continuous tempo till I hit the final stretch of 1.5 km on the trails. I checked my watch and I was well under my second target time of 4 hours. I kept pushing till the finish line where everyone welcomed me with claps and cheers. I didn’t waste the moment and did the Turkish Shooter pose, after all I finished second, I had all the rights to do so. My final time was 3:55:39 hours.
Hydration Strategy
2 hours before the race – Boiled Potato and one Chapati. Overnight soaked Almonds and few Munakka
10 mins before the race start time – 2 sips of Redbull
I had planned to consume 250 to 300 calories per hour. I used two packets of Stead Fast Carbonance mixture, 5 Leap Gels, one in every 40 mins and 1 Red bull.
Although I tried to stick to my hydration plan, but I do believe there is a lot of scope for improvement in this area. I will have to plan the fuelling more meticulously in my next race.
After Thoughts
I humbly believe, we can train, plan and execute the race well, but there is always a factor of luck which is not in our control. I thank the almighty for keeping me safe and strong throughout the race. On a day when anything could have gone wrong, nothing did.
Thanks for reading. Do let me know how you felt after reading this.
If you are new to trail running, this blog on Basics of Trail Running might help you get started.
