MARATHON DES SABLES
MYLES MCNULTY is raising money for Teenage Cancer Trust
Story
The Marathon Des Sables
Myles McNulty
1. Welcome
Thank you for taking the time to visit my website. In April 2006 I am participating in the 21st Marathon des Sables – Also known to people as “The Toughest Footrace on Earth”. The Marathon des Sables is a 151mile (as the crow flies but generally you can add a few extra miles on), 6-day endurance race across the Sahara Dessert in Morocco.
The aim of this site is to give you a flavour of what I am undertaking but most importantly WHY I am doing it and for what reason. A question I have asked myself a few times this last year.
2. Me
Name: - Myles Francis McNulty.
DOB: - 7th October 1964
Height: - 190 cm
Weight: - 92kg (at the moment…..)
I am married to Kendra and have two children Erin 10yrs and Fergus 8 yrs. They have all been very long suffering and more than understanding in my quest to compete in this the “Toughest Footrace on Earth”.
This crazy idea was put into my head by a very close friend Jules who, quite frankly, should be shot as he promised he would “do it” with me but has conveniently forgotten all about it.
I had always been quite sporty up until the age of 25 when I used the excuse of my ever expanding waist size on the pressure of work. In truth, as we all know, it was the love of cold beers and curry.
Up until then I had competed at rugby, cricket, cross country, and athletics all at County Standards.
Returning to fitness 4 years ago was the major watershed for me and running has now become an old friend. I have competed in quite a few marathons and completed London last year in a fairly respectable time. This however puts marathon training into a completely different category!
Not only is almost all of my training off road but at this time of year in the dark too. As one ultra distance runner put it “it helps to have a bad memory so you can only remember the good times”.
Wish me luck. (However you know what Gary Player used to say! You don’t? I’ll tell you if you want. It applies to everything).
3. The Marathon
Why this is the “Toughest Footrace on Earth”.
The 21st Marathon des Sables (MdesS) will take place on 10 - 16 April 2006 with around 200 British entrants amongst about 700 entrants from 25 countries. The distance covered will be 243km/151 miles (made up of legs of 25, 34, 38, 82, 42, 22 km) run over 6 days (7 for some), which is equivalent to 5 1/2 regular marathons.
That's a speed of between 3 and 14 km an hour .In addition to that, we have to carry everything we will need for the duration (apart from water and a tent) on our backs in a rucksack (food, clothes, medical kit, sleeping bag etc). “Don’t forget to pack your toothbrush”. I won’t but I will cut the handle in half to keep weight to an absolute minimum. Showers? Forget it.
We will have to prepare all our own food throughout the race. The body will have to contend with mid-day temperatures going up to 120°F and running on uneven rocky, stony ground as well as 15 - 20% of the distance being in sand dunes.
The heat, distance and rubbing will trash our feet and may cause severe trauma if incorrect shoes and equipment are not used. Mental stamina probably constitutes at least 50% of whether this race will be completed or not. Physical fitness is important but don't underestimate the mental stress that we will need to be endured.
Even if we have run dozens of 26-mile marathons (which of course I have not), this does not mean that we would automatically find the MdS easy.
On the 3rd day it is the dreaded Dunes day running continuously up and down 60 metres sand dunes for 36km, if that seems bad on the 4th day, we will set off across the barren wilderness to complete an 80km stage. Few people complete this before dark that evening and some will not come in till after dark the next night. This is followed by an in comparison relatively mild 42km Marathon stage!! It is tough!! Very tough!!
OH and just to let you know.
The majority of participants do finish the race but occasionally people have got lost along the way. In 1994 with sandstorms raging, an Italian Olympic Gold medallist went missing and after a massive rescue effort was found 9 days later and 44 pounds lighter, in Western Algeria.
4. Ben Fogle
This is an extract of Ben’s diary. He completed this event last year. Most people thought he was a complete prat until they saw his documentary at the beginning of this year. At the moment he is bobbing about the Atlantic in a boat with James Cracknell…….
“On why would anyone put themselves through the agony of a 150-mile race across the Sahara desert? Competitor Ben Fogle found out
If only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun, it takes a very different species to want to race across 140 miles of the Sahara desert on foot over seven days, in temperatures reaching 130 degrees Fahrenheit.
Easter Sunday, as millions of Britons tucked into their roast lunches, far away in southern Morocco, 600 competitors from more than 30 nations were getting ready to take part in one of the world's most extreme endurance events, the Marathon des Sables, a gruelling race in one of the most hostile environments on earth.
Self-sufficient except for water and medical assistance, runners have to carry their own food, sleeping bag, cooking utensils, clothing and emergency equipment in packs weighing up to 15kg. The course is divided into six stages that include wadis, mountains and strength-sapping dunes - but, mostly, vast expanses of remorseless, scorched Saharan flatlands. The crippling terrain is augmented by sporadic sandstorms that blow up out of nowhere. With a total absence of water in the air, sweat evaporates instantly.
What sort of fool would sign up for such a challenge? Well, somewhere among those 600 runners was competitor number 454, one Ben Fogle, a 30-year-old Londoner who had never run a marathon in his life, whose idea of exercise is a dog walk in Hyde Park, and whose diet is usually made up of Chablis, Starbucks coffee and salt and vinegar flavoured crisps.
Drunken bets are never a good idea, particularly when they are made just six weeks before what is often described as the toughest foot race on earth - which doesn't leave much time for the appropriate level of training required - but that is exactly how I came to sign up for the biggest challenge of my life. Only now, after hospital checks and several days on crutches, have I got the strength to describe the experience.
The Marathon des Sables was started nearly 20 years ago by Patrick Bauer, a former concert promoter from Troyes in France, who created the race after he walked 200 miles alone across the Algerian Sahara in 1984. He found the experience so harsh yet uplifting that he decided to make it an annual event.
The result is the annual ordeal that is "the Sand Marathon", which this year attracted 250 Britons, the largest international contingent. While many of the competitors are accomplished endurance athletes, many are just normal folk, from heart surgeons and ex-soldiers to plumbers and beauticians, all looking for adventure.
Derrick Khan, an IT consultant from London, signed up after surviving a helicopter crash. "I want to prove that life is back to normal," he says. "And to justify my lucky escape by benefiting others through fundraising."
Alf Ellis, from Gillingham, suffers from severe agoraphobia and couldn't leave his house until a year ago. He has decided he needs to confront his fear face on - in a desert the size of the United States.
I had been rather alarmed to discover that the race's insurance policy included a section on "corpse repatriation", though to date there has been just one fatality, a 20-year-old Frenchman who died of a massive heart attack in 1988. The organisers now insist that every runner undergoes a thorough medical before the event.
Rules are simple but strict: compulsory kit includes an emergency distress flare, an anti-venom pump for scorpion and snakebites, 2,500 calories of food per day and salt tablets. Each competitor is given a modest nine litres of water per day which is distributed at various points - drink any more and you are eliminated. “
And then there are the camels. Time limits each day are marked by two dromedaries that also complete the course. If you are unlucky enough to be overtaken by Charles and Camilla, as they were dubbed, then you are disqualified. Never has the sight of two camels caused such panic in the desert.
The exact course remains a secret until the day before the race, when runners are given a set of directions, complete with compass bearings and terrain description.
I am reassured to learn that the organisers have lost only one competitor for more than a day. In 1994, a Sicilian policeman got lost in a sandstorm and wandered the desert for nine days, living off bats and his own urine before being found 125 miles away in Algeria, some 44 lb lighter.
At 17 miles, Day One is a mere warm-up. The competitors' spirits are buoyed with adrenaline and excitement. Many have trained for months for this moment as we stream over the start line under the burning Sahara sun, helicopters circling above to capture the sight for 120 million television viewers around the world. I feel like an international athlete, taking on the world. But the full realisation of what lies ahead soon sinks in as our lungs fill with hot air; strides are soon reduced to a shuffle, back packs begin to rub and our feet swell and chaff.
Four hours later, I hobble into camp, deflated and demoralised by my first day, with a rather depressing set of blisters and an aching back. The "Doc Trotters", as the 30 French doctors are known, are waiting with scalpels drawn.
Doc Trotters have a fearsome reputation around camp; to avoid infection; blisters are not only pierced and drained, but removed completely. The skin is cut away, leaving my feet covered in large, red open sores.
Aching and swollen, I find Day Two's 21 miles significantly more difficult, and end the day with a further half dozen blisters. I'm dehydrated and hungry, and sleep inside the sieve-like tents is hampered by the freezing night-time temperatures. The Sahara has the greatest gap between nocturnal and diurnal temperatures on earth. I shake myself to sleep.
Day Three's course is 23 miles long, but there is an added twist - 12 miles of dunes. The sand splashes away like water, sapping my energy, demanding twice as much effort, but - worst of all - filling my shoes and aggravating more blisters. The dunes reflect the heat like an oven, baking me as if I were a bread roll. Twenty competitors abandon the race, including Alf Ellis, who, after becoming lost and disoriented in the dunes, collapses and passes out before summoning the energy to release his distress flare.
Day Four is the big one, a formidable 47 miles. We haven't had enough time to recover from the dunes and a desert form of Tourette's syndrome appears to have set in among the competitors. Navigation is possible by following the swear words and curses that echo across the desert. For someone who rarely uses bad language, I surprise myself with some of my outbursts.
As night falls, the temperature plummets and compass navigation becomes crucial. The sky is filled with stars - and the occasional flash of an emergency flare. I pass a number of runners wrapped in their foil blankets, awaiting helicopter rescue, as I stumble across the desert tundra to Check Point Four. A line of tiny torches snakes across the blackness of the Sahara all around me. By the time I reach the checkpoint, it is nearly nine in the evening. I have completed more than 27 miles, but there is still a daunting 19 to go before the day is over.
The Doc Trotter tent looks like a scene from M*A*S*H. Three runners are hooked up to drips, while a team of doctors cut, drain and strap various pairs of feet and administer painkillers. Close to delirium, I collapse on to a sand dune. Too exhausted to eat or drink, I manoeuvre my throbbing feet on to my backpack and try to rest. If I remove my shoes now, I know I will never get them back on. My socks are soaked with blood and pus.
I wake up at five in the morning, consume an energy bar and continue the torturous route towards camp. I am already eating into Day Five - recovery day - and every minute counts. For six long hours, I march, jog and shuffle my way across dunes and rocks.
With impeccable timing, the first sandstorm of the week descends as I navigate across the final few miles. Goggles and a neck scarf, pulled tightly over my mouth, provide limited protection from the sand. As the fine powder fills my lungs, it feels as if I am breathing underwater; my eyes tear under the goggles. Visibility is reduced from 12 miles to just a few hundred feet as I finally reach camp.
Competitors are forced to spend their recovery day zipped up in their sleeping bags as the storm continues to rage. Tents topple in the wind, and eating or answering the call of nature requires a monumental effort.
By now, firm friendships have been created and tales of heroics and pain are circulating around the camp. One Italian, it seems, has lost his entire little toe, and an American girl has decided to quit after losing her last remaining toe nail. But even broken bones, twisted ankles and knees aren't enough to stop the rest of us, as we hobble around camp with the aid of walking sticks, backs bent double in pain. Between us, we have already consumed 4,300 painkillers and one and a half miles of plasters.
Day Six, and the scorching sun returns. This time, the distance is 26 miles with a time limit of 10 hours. I am physically sick from the excruciating pain in my feet and develop a nose bleed from the dry dust in my nose, but I complete the day's course in just under eight hours. For the first time, reaching the end seems possible. Every part of my body is screaming at me to stop and my bowels have become traumatised by a concoction of antibiotics and anti-inflammatories, but I'm starting to believe that I can get there.
Hungry and smelly, we look like a ragged bunch on our final morning as we load our backpacks for the last time. But our spirits are bursting: just 13 miles separate us from this desert hell and the nirvana of civilisation and comfort that lies on the other side of the finish line.
The last few miles seem to take an eternity as we race through the Bedouin village of Ait Isfou, women and children watching in disbelief as a grubby army of western nomads huff and puff and curse on their way past, faces contorted in agony. I high-five the young children to whom we must resemble spacemen.
Before I know it, my legs have carried me almost to Tagounite, the end of the line and, suddenly, I turn a corner and there it is, the finish line, looking like a desert mirage. Time stands still and my mind swims as if I'm drunk. A crowd is shouting: "Come on, Ben." I race the final hundred metres, past hundreds of runners who have already finished and who are sipping cool bottles of Coca-Cola. A roar deafens me as I cross the line and collapse in a heap on the ground.
Suddenly it's all over. I've done it. Feet shredded, lips blistered and a stone lighter; I have beaten the desert. Of the 609 people who started, an impressive 553 have made it to the end of the race.
Tears pour down my sand-blasted face as Mr Bauer presents me with my finisher's medal and a kiss on both cheeks.
They are tears not only of euphoria, but because I know that this is the end of my great desert adventure, one that has changed my life forever”
5. Teenage Cancer Trust
My sister Diane lost her daughter to cancer almost 4 years ago. Below is a copy of a letter Diane sent when she was about to complete her first trek. She has recently returned from another quite recently.
Teenage Cancer Trust is an inspiration for anyone who comes into contact with them and puts any of our “disasters” firmly into perspective.
“As you know Margaux had just completed her A levels last June (2001) when she was diagnosed with cancer. Persistent knee pain, thought to be caused by a sports injury, was in fact an Osteosarcoma. The primary tumour in her knee was so aggressive that in four weeks from the initial onset of pain it had spread throughout her young growing body.
Margaux fought her illness with great courage and maintained positively focused on her recovery despite the frustrations of her mobility and missing out on teen life activities - all her friends were embarking on new adventures and she stoically wished them well and bade them farewell.
It is tragic, that cancer can strike at any time to anybody. It's a pernicious disease with its own lethal agenda - but particularly cruel for the young and adolescent in a time of physical, psychological and emotional growth.
The skills and attitude of the Teenage Cancer Trust, which was established in 1990, enhanced Margaux’s positive outlook during these traumatic times. The Teenage Cancer Trust has created ten special units at NHS hospitals around the country, which have revolutionised current treatment and recovery practices. Each unit is specifically geared to the requirements of today's teenager; providing dignity, state of the art medical equipment, leisure facilities, computer and televisual equipment and a comfortable and sympathetic environment that positively encourages friends, family visits and support. Matron no longer prowls, lights out is not at 7pm and the décor is more IKEA than Beatrix Potter!
Margaux’s illness did not improve and as a desperate measure to contain the spread of cancer it was recommended that her leg should be amputated - I'm sure we cannot imagine the horror of this prospect. The Teenage Cancer Trust provided the most sympathetic of environments where Margaux could meet other teenagers in similar circumstances, receive counselling & be kept focused on recovery.
Such was the amazing support that Margaux received from the Teenage Cancer Trust that she was determined to find ways of spreading the word about them and also to raise funds for future units.
The Teenage Cancer Trust, as a registered charity, creates a rolling programme of fund raising events each year and it was Margaux's dream and goal to go on a trek to Patagonia, South America in November 2002 after she had mastered her artificial limb.
Tragically Margaux died in January (2002). She made me promise was that I would take her place on the trek - such was her determination, spirit and young selfless maturity to think of others that could benefit from the vital and progressive service the trust offers teenagers suffering from cancer.
I travel to Patagonia in November in memory of Margaux and to raise much needed funds to help create more Teenage Cancer Trust units throughout the country. My goal is to raise £100,000.
Please help me help other teenagers like Margaux to combat cancer in a caring, contemporary and sympathetic Teenage Cancer Trust unit. Any donation will be greatly appreciated. Donations should be made payable to Teenage Cancer Trust, and then sent to me. I can give you an address if you drop me a line.
If you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact me.
Thank you in advance for your support”
I too have chosen to raise funds for Teenage Cancer Trust. The amazing units that the charity builds are leading to an anticipated 15% increase in survival rates and TCT desperately needs funds to build more so every teenager in the UK has access to one. The charity currently has 8 units but needs at least another 14. With each unit costing an average £2 million, this is no small task. All the funds I raise from this challenge will go towards ensuring a better quality of life for thousands of teenagers.
Visit www.teenagecancertrust.org for more information.
Set out below, there are two sets of Sponsorship forms you can download in either pdf or word format. There are also some Gift Aid Forms, again in either format. The latter will enable Personal donations to be gift aided enabling Teenage Cancer Trust to claim a further 28p per £ donated. If you pay tax in the U.K. you can increase the value of your donation. To make your gift worth an extra 28% to TCT, without costing you any more, please complete the form so the charity can recover tax from the Inland Revenue.
Sponsorship form (PDF) | Sponsorship from (Doc) || Gift Aid (PDF) | Gift Aid (Doc)
6. The result and the aim
Very quickly before you become completely bored this is what I want you to do. Admit to yourselves this is something you have to donate to.
The result therefore is to raise more money for the charity. Go to this link.
https://www.teenagecancertrust.org/main/
Other Links.
http://www.darbaroud.com/uk/indexuk.html
7. Sponsors
Aro Sports (Hitchin Harpenden and Redborne)
MandM Sports
Thanks to Chris Bishop at the David LLoyd in my training
Justin at Coleman Croft Saddlery in stitching my gaitors to my shoes.
Thank you again for your time.
Myles McNulty.