Jan 10
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UTMB Podium Finisher chooses the 2019 UTMR 100 mile course for his next big challenge in order to keep focused, and to keep slim. He joins top 5 UTMB finisher Damian Hall and 11th place Petter Restorp.
After last year’s UTMB, finishing 6th, I fulfilled my sporty ambitions and it was about a time to retire from the sport of Mountain Ultra Running. I was looking forward to a bright future and a great lifestyle with no extra energy wastage!
I’ve been off the running for a few months and guess what: I am almost faced with a need to upgrade my wardrobe to a XXL size. No surprise for a man who is highly appreciating high sugar and carb diet as a daily nutritional plan. Frustration about getting oversized rose up and I started looking for motivation to start moving again. No running this time!
Latvia’s Roman Evarts takes sixth at #UTMB 2018 in 22:38:29. pic.twitter.com/I9a2gAe2b8
— iRunFar (@iRunFar) September 1, 2018
Playing some ball game would be ideal, I thought. But it turned out that all my old football buddies became useless, as the only football they are doing nowadays is the PlayStation football. “Bummer!” But that’s ok; it was a great opportunity for me to put all the old habits aside and try something completely new.
Unfortunately to jump on a new wave routine wasn’t easy, as I came to the point when from the few option I had to choose between MMA fighting and CrossFit. As my last kickboxing tournament 20 years ago left me with a half damaged brains I decided to go for CrossFit.
Long story short: to keep up with athletes from this sport I found I would have to spend most of the time shirtless and drastically improve my selfie taking skills. As I am well known for the worst selfies on Instagram – the right decision for me was to give up this intention.
As you can imagine after all these adventures I’ve been in a bad mood and was taking extra dosage of ice-cream to get myself back from the dark hole. So the circle been closing and again I found myself sitting on a rooftop in Nepal looking for a big mountain race where I could take my running shoes for a walk.
The UTMR 100 miler has been on my radar for couple of years. I know the area and have been on some parts of the course, but never had an opportunity to have a see how the whole loop around Monte Rosa looks. The awesomeness of the area, the competitiveness of the next edition’s field and the right proportion of the miles vs elevation gain was the indication for me to enter without any doubts. For anyone who missed the UTMB lottery, this is a great, but hard, alternative.
This definitely will keep me moving and give some extra motivation to be out in the mountains during the summertime. But now I am out to have more ice-cream, as the signing up for the race doesn’t mean you have to start training straight away!
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