Dolomites Ultra Trail, Brixen, Italy (72k, 4100m D+)

I learned about the Brixen Dolomites Ultra Trail from a Facebook post in which a fellow runner was looking for a team partner as his original choice had deserted him. The race, which can only be run as a team, goes through areas I’m somewhat familiar with from previous vacations, so I thought that it was the right opportunity for me and my brother for a very extended and long 18h hike, getting back to Brixen in time for the award ceremony. However, my brother took the easy way out by rupturing a ligament for the third time in two years three weeks ahead of the race, so now I was the one looking for a running blind date in ultra-runner Facebook groups. Fortunately, I quickly found a former Iron Man triathlete who had started venturing into ultrarunning a couple of years ago, completing iconic races such as the UTMB and Tor Des Geants. Thus, I thought that if anybody needed carrying or convincing to finish, it was going to be me.

The race was scheduled to start at midnight, so with Brixen being about 3h away from Munich we arrived late in the afternoon and had plenty of time to get mentally ready. While I so far thought it was impossible to eat badly in Southern Tyrolia and have bad pizza in Italy, the place we went to for pizza slices in Brixen proved me wrong. Tuna pizza may have been a particular bold choice ahead of a race, which fortunately did not have serious repercussions. At the race briefing one hour before the start, we learned that the route had been shortened by 16km (turns out it was only 12km) and 700m of climb as parts of the course were still covered in 2m deep snow. Out of my 8 races, this has happened 4 times so far, which is somewhat annoying at the start but much appreciated about 50km in. 

We started one minute past midnight, quickly leaving the city behind us and climbing on good forest paths towards the first aid station at Afers, 10km and 1000m of climb in. When the slope started to pick up I quickly noticed that my running partner was not at the peak of his game as he switched to power and then not-so-power hiking fairly quickly. As this reduced the risk of early over-pacing for me I was quite happy to follow along at a moderate effort. It turned out that while my partner was a seasoned ultra-running veteran, he had not had time to do any dedicated long distance training for quite a while, and the late (or early, depending on the perspective) start and questionable choice of dinner probably contributed as well. After the first aid station which we hit right at the 1.30h mark, a short downhill was followed by a seriously steep climb on a forest path, and a subsequent more moderate climb on a fire road. Here, other runners started to catch up with us, but my partner's competitive spirit kept us at a pace which just held off most of them. However, after the second aid station after km 20 and 1800m climb we had to reduce the pace further which allowed about 5 teams to pass us on a section alternating between exposed trails and runnable forest paths (the Günther-Messner-Steig, built by Reinhold Messner to commemorate his brother's untimely death at the Nanga Parbat). 

 

On the next climb to the checkpoint Schlüterhütte (27k and 2700m of climb in, around 5am) it started to dawn, and we were treated to a spirit-lifting sunrise which was hard to surpass. The checkpoint was serving hot soup which was much appreciated by my partner, but we quickly moved on as the weather was just warm enough for a base layer while moving, and putting on additional layers just when the sun was coming up seemed to be overkill.

After the Schlüterhütte, we added about 15mins to our time by missing a turn and climbing a small peak, but given the views we hardly cared.

A long downhill to Campill on very runnable gravel paths followed which boosted our pace to about 5.30min per km for the first time in the race.

During the downhill, we were passed by two mixed male-female teams which we apparently had underestimated so far - we managed to catch one of them again later, but the other one finished at least half an hour ahead of us. Campill was the first aid station with solid food, and I was grateful for a bread roll with ham to fill my stomach with something other than gels and power bars. Nutrition was working very well for me so far, though, as the temperatures were ideal and the effort was very manageable. This ended up being one of the few races in which I neither felt queasy nor bonked at any time. When the “Geriatric runners” team (actual team name) arrived at the aid station we hastily left for the next big climb of about 1000m to the Fornella hut (45km and 3700m climb).

 

While we caught sight of the mixed teams on steep switchbacks again I estimated that they were about 8mins ahead of us. At this point, my partner wasn’t enthusiastic about keeping up a running pace even on runnable sections, so I dug into my motivational bag of tricks which mainly consisted of lying about the remaining distance/climb, pointing out beautiful landmarks and claiming how much of a walk in the park this was compared to his other races. Still, big probs to my team partner for pulling through a race which seemingly wasn’t fun from the get-go and got only harder afterwards.

After the Fornella hut, we descended on a steep and technical path into a valley and then started climbing again towards Kreuztal, sitting about three quarters up on the Plose mountain. On the same day, the Plose marathon (starting in Brixen and finishing 2000m higher up on the Plose peak) was taking place, and the ultra trail shared a couple of kilometers with the marathon. Our timing was such that we ended up being overtaken by a throng of ambitious hobby runners about 30k into their race, many of whom probably thought we were random hikers and did not even say “thanks” when we stepped off the trail to let them pass. Displaying my ultra-bib (which probably did not mean anything to the marathoners anyway) I started trolling the marathoners by sarcastically cheering them on when they passed at a brisk hiking speed (as I had been awake for about 28h and running for 11h at this point I hope I can be forgiven for reacting to non-sportsmanlike behavior in a similar vein).

 

At Kreuztal (Cross Valley, a bit of a misnomer given that a 1500m descent started just beyond the checkpoint), runners were cheered on by an announcer and a crowd of spectators which provided a much needed confirmation that we were still participating in a race despite having hiked most of the course since the Fornella hut. Down we went onto the final descent in which my team mate’s knee started to give out which did not help our pace. At this point, we were fighting to keep the “Geriatric runners” and one of the mixed teams we had passed shortly before Kreuztal at bay. While we were in no-mans-country placement-wise, we were still both competitive enough to cling on to whichever place we were currently in – “if you have an ounce of honor left in your body, they shall not pass” drew a good chuckle (but no measurable increase in speed). The heat started to pick up as we lost altitude and approached Brixen. While the last couple km were on the same route as the start, we didn't recognize any features until we entered the final stretch towards the Brixen main plaza. The finish photographer was asleep at the wheel and tried to compensate with a dozen photos after we had crossed the finish line, and so our final 100m running effort went undocumented for posterity.

 

We finished in 13.06h, placing 39^th out of 72 starters. For comparison, the winner (a local pro-runner) finished in less than 9h, and most local runners stayed below 11h – training in this area really seems to give you an edge, or the mountain folk is just made from stronger stuff than us weak lowlanders. Overall, the course was very well chosen, with paths that were never overly technical nor boring. Again, my running mate pulled through in admirable style, despite having an off day and many km of his personal purgatory (steep fire roads). Surprisingly, I never suffered from sleepiness (caffeine gels probably helped), queasiness or muscle/joint issues, which serves as a learning that I can probably do significantly longer distances as long as I keep the effort moderate.

 

Official website: https://www.brixenmarathon.com/ultra.html

GPX track: https://www.brixenmarathon.com/info/DUT-Variante-Campill.gpx