This Blog Is Now Hosted At GaryRobbins.ca: Transkarukera 120km, Guadeloupe

I've kept my latest racing plans a little under the radar over the last eight weeks. This was nothing more than wanting to ensure I was 100% recovered from the lingering foot issues I've dealt with this year and not wanting to outwardly commit to a racing goal until I knew I was good to go.

Near the end of the HURT 100 in January I started experiencing metatarsalgia style pain in my left foot, the opposite foot to which I'd twice before broken. I seemed to have successfully worked through the initial issue by late March and had confidently lined up for the UTMF at the end of April. One of the most disappointing races of my life was to follow and even though I wasn't having my day I was proud of how hard I continued to fight through, only to be forced into a DNF after 105 kilometers due to the foot issue flaring up again.

Throughout May I rediscovered my road bike while working with numerous top local practitioners and by early June I started back to fairly normal training volumes again. I made a conscious decision not to go up into the 100 mile plus training volumes of one year ago. I know that my body can happily handle that volume, but to force it on my foot after a lingering injury would simply be playing Russian Roulette with myself. I officially seemed to have turned a corner in the last few days of May, and every week since then has consisted of at least sixteen hours of movement.

The first three weeks had lots of hiking and biking hours built in, and the last four weeks have been solid mountain running mileage while complimented with some intense biking sessions. The last four weeks in particular add up to 73 hours with 480km / 300m, 25,000m / 82,000ft of that being on foot. I've felt great throughout, gotten stronger week after week, set the Hanes Valley FKT along the way (2h49m) and managed to not get hit by lightning while working pacing duties for Adam down at Hardrock last week. All in all, I feel about ready to let one rip.

Guadeloupe. What? Guadeloupe. Where? Guadeloupe. How? Guadeloupe. Huh?

Yeah well funny story. The Skyrunning World Champs in Chamonix last month was to be a goal race for me this year, and while conditioning my sit bone to accept a bike saddle again in May I was coming to terms with the fact that the June 28th race date simply wasn't going to allow me to recover and train effectively in time. I then had a communication with this race in Guadeloupe, Transkarukera, or TRANSKA for short. The race date of July 25th, being one month further on was ideal. Here's the thing though, as I dug deeper I was shocked at what I discovered about this race. You ready for this?

The race is just 120km long, yet it boasts 9700 METERS of climbing and descent! It's a Caribbean Island, how is that even possible!? Those are UTMB and UTMF stats but the race is a full ultra distance shorter than both of those (-~45km)!!

Digging deeper still, the course record was OVER twenty-seven hours AND that run time was heralded as an unbelievable time for the course! The second place finisher in 2013 was Christophe Le Saux, who I've run with twice now at UTMF. Christophe finished the 2013 and 2014 UTMF in 13th place, his 2013 time was 22h51m while his 2014 time was 23h41m. Christophe's time at his 2013 2nd place running of the TRANSKA 120k...thirty-three f#@king hours!

How does a race have climbing stats in line with the toughest 100 milers out there, while being significantly shorter, and end up with nearly inexplicably longer finish times? I'm not entirely sure, though some communications since then have helped paint the picture a little clearer, this one in particular,

"There is a 33km mountain stretch that you will run at night with overgrowth to navigate, and you will need to be fully self sufficient for a six to eight hour period. You should also carry a GPS device with the race route loaded into it, to prevent getting lost."

I'm guessing you throw in some Caribbean heat and humidity, and what I can only guess to be HURT like volcanic island technicality and all in all it sounds like a nice little hike in the woods to me.

Some slightly disappointing news as of a few days ago; it looks like they had to make a slight course change this year. The distance stays the same but they'll lose the better part of 1700 meters of elevation, bringing it down to a still rather unbelievable 8000 meters.

Another cool feature with this race is that they make people carry a live GPS tracking device, meaning that you can pull up their website at any point in time and get up to the second updates as to how the race is unfolding. I believe this is the future of ultra running. I'm sure this device in 2014 will be quite bulky and cumbersome, but once these things get dialed down in size can you imagine being able to watch Western States or UTMB via a live up to the second GPS feed verses twitter updates every fifteen to sixty minutes. I think it's safe to say that this will occur at some point in time, and when it does I know I personally will get even less accomplished on the big event race days.

Guadeloupe is a French island in the Caribbean that operates on the Euro. Damn the French have it FIGURED OUT with owning small tropical islands around the world!

I fly out on Monday, July 21st and the race starts at 8pm on Friday, July 25th. Here's the link to the website and to their Facebook Page on which I'm guessing they'll eventually show their live tracking data. I'll attempt to update in the days leading up to the event.

As a side note, the race director Gerard has been incredible at helping me piece everything together via Google Translate conversations. Being a race director myself I know that I've been a huge pain in the ass over the last few weeks.

Basic Info:
Guadeloupe (/ɡwɑːdəˈluːp/; French pronunciation: [ɡwadəlup]; Antillean Creole: Gwadloup) is a group of Caribbean islands located in the Leeward Islands, in the Lesser Antilles, with a land area of 1,628 square kilometres (629 sq. mi) and a population of 405,739 inhabitants (as of Jan. 2013).[1][note 1] It is an overseas region of France, consisting of a single overseas department. Guadeloupe is an integral part of France, as are the other overseas departments. Besides Guadeloupe's two islands of Basse-Terre and Grande-Terre, the smaller islands of Marie-Galante, La Désirade, and the Îles des Saintes are included in Guadeloupe.

As part of France, Guadeloupe is part of the European Union and the Eurozone; hence, as for all Eurozone countries, its currency is the euro.[3] However, as an overseas department, Guadeloupe is not part of the Schengen Area. The prefecture (i.e. French regional capital) of Guadeloupe is Basse-Terre. Its official language is French, although many of its inhabitants also speak Antillean Creole (Créole Guadeloupéen).

Imagery that gets me stoked: