Transalpine Run – DAY 2 Written on September 6, 2009, by andys.
Transalpine Run â DAY 2
Length: 24.6km
Climb: 2014m up / 2169m down
Andy & Tom: 1st overall / 2hr 39min 55sec
Ben and Angela: 1st mixed team + 7th overall
Heart rate: ave = 150bpm / max = 173
Wow. Another cracking day of alpine running. Day 1 made for some great running, but today was even better. The organisers really have done a great job in terms of route choice so far. Letâs hope it continues â I certainly wonât be complaining about spending 8 days running through mountains like this, even if it hurts a littleâ¦
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Day 2 was one of the shorter stages, but all the same there was a fair chunk of climbing, a 2700m summit, plenty of snow, ice and some fairly interesting steep and rocky sections, some of which had ropes and chains (which you could use if you wanted to slow yourself down!). Unlike yesterday, there was no âsitting inâ today, we lead from the start and pulled out a lead of several minutes by the top. We relaxed and enjoyed the rougher sections of descent off the third and final top, followed by five miles of quad-bashing forest tracks into the small ski town of St Anton, stretching out a lead of over 10 minutes by the finish banner.
Once again we found an incredibly cold river to sit in for as long as we could handle and Tim, Andy, Carole and Elliot were quickly on hand to provide ridiculous quantities of ZipVit and apple struddle â is there a better recovery combo? â I guess weâll find out tomorrow. Have a suspicion the legs might be a little sore all the same.
Great to have a 25+ minute lead already, but with only a quarter of the days and distance under the belt we wonât be getting complacent, thereâs a very long way still to go (approx 180km in fact).
Angela and Ben had another storming day, similarly finishing a clear 10 minutes in front of the next chasing mixed team.
Andy
