Today I am very happy to announce that I have become an ultramarathoner! Yesterday, 23rd June 2019, I completed the 60k Veluwezoom Trail race in Dieren, The Netherlands. This was my first and longest trail race and I loved every kilometer of it!

Yesterday was a hot (~30 C), long day. The race started at ~7:40am and I finished by ~2:42pm. I went around the Veluwezoom National park, and I did some climbs with a total ascent of ~470 meters. It took me around 7hr 2min to complete, and when I finished I simply thought ‘this race was a great success’. 

I finished in position 35 (out of 79 runners) and 4th place in women category. It went very good for being the first time I participated in this kind of event. However, that is not the reason I am defining this race as successful. Every time you and I go out there and do something for the first time, say we run 5- or 10-km, half-marathon, marathon or ultra-race, we run into the unknown. It does not matter how well we prepare for it, how much we read about it, and how much we train. If we have never done it before, we do not know how it is going to go, how it is going to feel. The only things that we know are the problems we may encounter, e.g. pain in parts of our body, stomach distress, lack of concentration. If we are able to solve those problems, or take the necessary measures to not even have them in first place, then we can say that our running adventure was a great success!

In my 60k experience, the first 20k were ok, but not super good. I could not focus very well, I was feeling tired, with a bit of pain in my hip. So I put some happy music in mp3 and I talked to myself. I said ‘Camila, you can do this, take it easy, keep going and keep eating’. 

So that’s what I did, I did not push it very hard but I kept moving. And of course, the first thing I did not neglect was the fueling. I knew that to complete the 60k I needed energy, so days before I did some math. I calculated that given my body weight and size (~49 kg and 1.5 meters, I am tiny! 🙂 ) I would be ok by consuming 150 calories per hour, and drinking as close as 400-500 millilitres of sport drinks and water per hour. That corresponds to ~40-50 grams of carbs and ~300 milligrams of sodium per hour. The picture below shows an example of the energy bars and gels I took.

I carried the food, sport drinks and water in a running backpack (in my case the Osprey Duro 6), with 2 water bottles and a camelback (see picture below).

After I packed all my stuff. On race morning I was ready to go! 

When I reached the check-point at 30k mark I was feeling much better. I was focused, enjoying the amazing views. My fueling plan was working perfectly, I had not stomach issues at all during the race. When I got to the 40k mark I was flying, at this point I felt my muscles strong, no pain whatsoever, and my stomach ready to keep eating.

The last 20k were not at all as terrifying as I had imagined. I was feeling good, my legs and my stomach were cooperating, and my mind was on race-moment. So I push it and I finished with a big smile! 

Happy running!