KAT100 Marathon Trail, Fieberbrunn, Austria (49k, 2500m D+)

As a tune-up race for this year's main event in August (TDS), I revisited the KAT100 Marathon Trail in Fieberbrunn, near Kitzbühel. The course had been altered somewhat, now covering only 48km and going up the same mountain (Wildseeloder) twice, albeit from different directions. Having done some competitor research ahead of the race, it seemed like my ITRA score could put me on the podium this time, after missing it narrowly at the Trail Grand Ballon by about 2 minutes. I deviated from my normal race strategy of running my own race and rolling up the field from behind accordingly, which did not quite pay the dividends I expected.

Due to a high thunderstorm risk, the course was altered a couple of hours before the 7am start, still going up Wildseeloder twice, but only to a point about 500m below the peak, and on exactly the same route. The organizers also kept the option open to end the race after the first loop if the weather should change drastically, which they would only announce once the first runner was about to complete the first loop. This reduced the total climb from 3100m to about 2500m as an additional out-and-back leg with some climbing was added.

In a misguided attempt at professionalism, I had convinced my girlfriend to come along and provide support mainly in the form of handing over additional gels at aid stations. But the evening before the race, I re-read the regulations and saw that outside assistance wasn't allowed, even at aid stations, which meant that I would have to carry gels for 5-6h right from the get-go. However, it turned out that local runners were a bit more free-wheeling, having their friends provide several unofficial aid stations along the course.

The first part of the race was an 8km/900m climb during which I initially tried to keep up with the two front runners. I abandoned this project after 3km when my pulse rate hit 190, and settled into a more sustainable pace. However, this initial all-out effort at 7am already messed a lot with my overall well-being, and it took me about 3h to recover from it. Filling both bottles with Isostar also turned out to be a mistake, as a massive intake of sugary calories early in the morning was not what my digestive system was prepared for.

I reached the top of the climb after about 1:05h, looking forward to recover somewhat during the descent. Little did I know that descents today were even more painful than uphills, as we were going down at a break-neck speed mostly on runnable forest roads which meant a high level of effort, particularly as I was feeling a bit constricted around the chest that day, probably due to having my new running vest fastened too tightly, or as an aftermath of the Covid infection I had caught at the Lavaredo ultra trail.

35mins later, we were down at the bottom of the mountain again and reached the first aid station. I stopped for two minutes, having abandoned the thought of racing competitively today as both uphill and downhill seemed to hurt way out of proportion. The next stretch were 7 runnable km with 400m of altitude gain to a random turnaround point on a forest road. Here, I was told that we were going the full distance of 48km, instead of stopping at Fieberbrunn after 32km - at this point, I did not consider this particularly good news as I was feeling somewhat better, but still not very motivated to climb up the Wildseeloder on the same track again.

Reaching Fieberbrunn after about 3:20h, I stumbled and almost fell over the time mat which gave me a nice black toenail and an interesting pre-finish photo. I then took my time and had a short sit-down, fairly surprised that I was currently 6th place overall and 5th place in the men's race. Then, up the Wildseeloder we went again, at a somewhat slower pace than on the first loop. 

Due to my longer break at Fieberbrunn, I had some other runners to catch again, and made good a few places before we reached the top again. I was running a bit low on water this time, so I stopped at the peak aid station for some fairly inefficient refuelling - dropping and unfolding my thermal blanket when pulling out my cup, filling a bottle with iso, walking on for a couple of meters, and then returning to fill the other bottle with water. However, this allowed me to latch onto a female runner I had passed uphill, who did a very good job of bringing us to the bottom very quickly and again very painfully.

On the final 3km stretch back to the finish line, I managed to catch up to the male runner in 4th position, but unfortunately he was able to match my speed when he saw me coming, and I decided not to force a sprint finish which would only screw up our finish photos and which I was likely to lose anyway. I finished the race after 5:31h, about 1:30min after the male third place, and second in my age group. While a "real" non-age-group podium finish was again less than 2 minutes away, I think I still gave it a good shot, being beaten by two dark horses who only signed up on the day of the race and thus were not visible in the starter list I had stalked in preparation. Also, the muscle soreness over the next few days really was something else - apparently, bombing down 900m descents twice within a couple of hours with a 1.5kg pack is something I was not fully prepared for. Even though I received no direct assistance I'm very grateful to my girlfriend for coming along, as I seem to finish faster when someone is waiting for me at the finish line.

Official website: https://kat100.at/

Offical course: https://tracedetrail.fr/en/trace/trace/171153