Trans 555 Story - Niger - Nov 2004

[ARReports]

Kerri from the Yahoo! BAAR group passed along this awesome story from her friend Dimitri Kieffer. It's Dimitri's account of a 347-mile trekking race across Niger, the "Trans 555" or "Route du Sel":

Subj: FW: Out of Niger in one piece...
From: "Dimitri Kieffer" <dimitri_kieffer@hotmail.com>

Warning: this is long but seriously I could not describe what I went
through in a few words…

Hello everyone,

Just got back from Niger 48 hrs ago where I was able to experience
an incredible race/trip/adventure.

http://www.extreme-runner.com/


==============

Niger Trans 555km (347 miles non_stop)
Bilma – Fachi – Arbre de Tenere – Puit de Benabo
La Route Du Sel

Organizing the race:

I first must say that it must have been quite a challenge for the
race director to stage this race taking into the local conditions:

- 555 kms from the starting point to the finish of sand
(very soft sand, semi hard sand and sand dunes…)
No wonder the Tenere desert is often called the "desert amongst the
deserts" (le desert des deserts.)
We were warned ahead of time, but it really felt like we were
crossing an ocean, "swimming"/running from one checkpoint to the
next spaced apart 22 kms, finding them progressively thanks only to
our GPS.
Arriving in mid day (at around 50 Degrees Celsius) to one of this
CP, felt like swimming and reaching a buoy in high seas, looking for
a bit of food, 4.5 liters of water and especially some shade. Shade,
shade…. Mmmm, we saw some trees at the start in the oasis of
Bilma and then in the oasis of Fachi (after 170kms) and not again
til marker 440 km…
So, between km 0 and 440, we only saw one "green spot", which really
felt a bit like Hawaii on a cross Pacific crossing from Los Angeles
to Tokyo…

- Gas: yep, you bet it, no gas station on a trip like this
where usually camels travel by, so every single 4*4 will have to
carry its own gas for the 1110kms (550 k Round trip), no more, no
less… This means that the trucks carrying on the European TV crew
and journalists will not be able to go back and forth between the
front racers and the back of the pack… no chance to back track for
any vehicles… So, you can understand that this will mean very
limited TV coverage for the poor chaps such as your humble scribe
lost in the middle of the pack….

- Bargaining/ Negotiation: After the one way 555kms to get
to the start of the race, the truck driver and crew decided to get
greedy and ask way too much money to bring all of the water, food,
gear along the course. The Race Director had to refuse and instead
spread the weight amongst all of the ten 4*4 and reduce
the "accommodations" for each CP from one nomad tent to simply a
tiny canopy the size of a car where all of the racers will have to
cram under at mid day when it became too hot to run…I must say that
one of the French staff Perrine also provided an incredible amount
of support and ingenuity to make this race a success.

- Sand Dunes: on the way to the start of the race which we
reached after 2.5 days of 4*4, we had quite a bit of damages –
multiple tire punctures, broken suspension and else as well as to
top it up, on the way back, one of the driver/pasta chef even
managed to completely tip over a vehicle on a sand dune, having to
re-raise the roof thereafter…

Racing:
30 proven racers started, all of them except 2 had in the past at
least completed one 333km Alain Gestin non-stop challenging desert
races.
Out of 30, I believe that 20 finished, representing France, USA,
Italy, Switzerland, Holland, and maybe one or two other European
country that I forgot...
Alicja Barahona (Canadian Polish woman) won the race in an
incredible 6 days and a few hours…
I finished in 14th position tie with a Dutch racer Wilko with whom I
raced the last 4 days in 196 hours (8 days and a few hours…)

Not so bad when one considers once again that it took us 2.5 days to
do the same course in reverse order to get to the start in 4*4 To put it
in perspective, one should consider that Alicja is really
an incredible athlete, training on 250km non-stop runs regularly on
weekends, allowing her to maintain a very strong and steady speed as
well as excelling quite well with sleep deprivation….

While receiving her trophy, Alicja also stated that while looking at
the amount of grey hair around the room, she could only say
that "just like red wine, long distance runners must be aging quite
well".
In fact, all of the top five finishers were more than 50 years old.

On a side note, I am actually looking forward to see Alicja again in
Alaska in Feb/March 2005 for the Iditarod Trail Invitational where
we will be both competing.



Personally, I started fairly well on the very first day, but felt
short when I expected to get a full meal at the first CP (22kms) and
instead only got what the race director was calling "grignotages" (a
few peanuts here and there…)
By that point, we have been struggling through our first mid day
heat and a few racers had already retired from the race, having
succumbed to the heat. Not a place to short change on food….
Nevertheless, I decided to proceed but finally decided to lay down
around 6pm in the sand between two checkpoints when the heat went
down and when my head really started spinning… I laid there and felt
asleep for 3 hours. I finally woke up in the dark, felt pretty good,
and turned back on my GPS and progress ahead towards the next CP
just like a little pink energizer bunny beating his drum non-stop…

A few minutes later, I heard "Allo Dimitri ?" I turned around and of
course noticed nobody behind me in the desert… I suddenly realized
that the voice was actually coming out of my backpack where my 3 lbs
beacon/transmitter was located… Yes, a voice was indeed calling me.
No one else but Alain , the race director, asking me where the hell
I was and why I had not yet arrived at to the next CP … Kind of
freaky when you are in the middle of the desert by yourself… Big
Brother was definitely watching me then…
In any case, I report my location according to my GPS (8kms from the
next CP) and gave my estimated arrival time… By the time, I got to
the next CP (CP2), I was in 26th position and it was going to be a
long way back to finish in 14th at CP 24….



Landscape and People:
Thanks to this race, we were able to embark on an incredible
journey, following the course of the salt caravans (La route du sel)
where cameleers take thousands of camels from one side of the desert
to the other to fetch salt and return back to Agadez… It was quite
incredible to travel side by side and pass these camels on the
course. I felt like I was thrown back in time 1000 years ago,
following these camels.
Having said that, we, the runners quickly learned to walk on the
side and not in the "camel paths" since the beasts are able to tramp
any patch of hard sand into mushy soft sand, much more challenging
to trek.
It was also a real reminder of the gruesome environment when from
time to time we will come across the entire skeleton of a camel who
died exhausted in the desert during one of his numerous crossings…



As the race director told us before the race started: ":Fais toi
petit devant le desert" (Make yourself small in front of the desert)
Similar to crossing an ocean, or conquering a major mountain, I
learned that this desert should definitely be taken seriously and
therefore definitely required a certain amount of "humility" and
carefulness if I wanted to come out of there alive…



I also learned a great deal from the local Nigerian team that
supported us during the race: local Touareg doctor/ nurse and 4*4
Drivers as well as Hausa drivers…
It was great to exchange stories before and after the race with
these different groups of people that all use the French language as
their Lingua Franca to communicate among themselves.

It was quite amusing how they really consider all of us racers
completely crazy for what we were embarking on, although betting
among them on who would finish the course…

Thank God, Allah or whoever that I got along well from the start
with every local staff member, I will indeed need any favour I could
get during this crossing: an extra bit of space for 1 hour next to a
campfire, a the a la menthe to get me started again or even a few
extra noodles on my plate…

The day after I completed the race, having finally slept 16 hrs
straight, I decided to get out around town and take advantage of my
last day in Niger and the last day of Ramadan, which meant major
celebrations… I started by going to a Beri Beri barber (0.75 cents),
then on to a Touareg street pedicure (0.25 cents) to repair my feet,
and then roamed around the covered market for a few hours where I
saw an incredible mixture of races living apparently harmoniously
amongst themselves: Arabs, Touaregs, Peuls, Hausas, Beri-Beris all
shopping for new clothes and ready to celebrate the end of the
Ramadan… Just wished it could be the same everywhere else in Western
Africa especially right now when it is starting to really blow up in
Ivory Coast. In any case, I will keep a great vision of that
afternoon in that covered market.
After the market, I was also invited to drink another "The a la
menthe" at a Touareg's home where I met his brother, the local
schoolteacher. I asked him if he could take me to his school which
was definitely an eye opener: a tiny straw house where 40 students
crowd themselves every day in front of a black board…
Definitely need to investigate what I and others can do to help in
the future the education in these impoverished nations. I will let
you know later what I have in mind…



On a brighter note, I met later in the evening with one of our
desert 4*4 drivers who took me to 3 different local clubs/parties
where I experienced some great live Hausa music, Touareg Guitar and
finally African rap…
It definitely was a great way to finish this trip and experience a
bit more the local culture.

Wildlife:

Getting back to the race, besides domesticated camels, donkeys and
goats the only wildlife that I saw was a poor little scorpion on
whom I almost stepped accidentally and a curious fennec running by
in the middle of the day.


However on the last 200kms, I came across another interesting type
of "wildlife"… Convoys of huge trucks going straight North on a
joining "paste" towards Libya.



Each one of these green trucks was smuggling huge amount of
cigarettes (on the average 800K$ worth per truck soon to be resold
on European markets) as well as additional peripheral drugs + about
30 poor chaps holding on top of the goods and even sometimes a few
live goats surfing on the very top ready to be eaten/sold along the
way… These trucks were of course escorted by no one else than the
Niger border patrols to avoid any altercations with potential
raiders/bandits along the way.

You know you are staging a race in a colourful location when drug
smugglers slow down at your CPs mistaking them for potential
raiders' hangouts….
Seriously, this meant that once when I was running at night near one
of this truck, I decided to take "extra precautions", turning off my
head light to avoid being seen…


Running strategy: 4 days alone and 4 days in tandem
After having raced for 4 days alone, I realized that a lot of racers
where teeming themselves up in teams of 2 or 3. Therefore, I decided
to do the same and finally teamed myself up with Wilko, a 31 yrs
old Dutch Green Beret Sergeant Major and ex Olympic swimmer who was
here mostly because he traditionally could not stand the heat… and
some of you thought that I was crazy !
Well, over the next few days, listening to some of his stories in
Afghanistan and elsewhere, I definitely was able to stay awake while
crossing sand dunes in the night in a way that my little I pod could
never have sustained…
Although I must say the I pod with the additional battery charger is
a great music tool for multiple days solo races…

On a serious note, I definitely must say that I did very much like
spending the last 4 days of the race with another racer, making the
desert much more bearable and enhancing simultaneously a good
friendship !

Sleep: Over the days, I progressively learned to split my sleep in 2
sessions: 1 to 1.5 hours around midnight and 1 to 1.5 hours in mid
day when the heat was too strong to run although not allowing me to
really fall asleep deeply…

Towards the end of the race, considering the heat, this was not
enough sleep and I started of course having a few interesting
hallucinations… seeing imaginary chickens crossing the trail all
over, seeing imaginary people greeting me along the course such as a
Chinese soldier in uniform with his wife not willing to be taken in
photographs…

Once in a while, I would also close my eyes for a second and
suddenly see myself in the middle of a forest or a huge ballroom in
a French castle…. ;-)



Having said that the night vision offered by a tiny Petzl Tika lamp
at night was from time to time quite strange, quite blurry… Staring
at miles and miles of undulated sand banks and sand dunes, I often
felt that I was in the middle of a very long scuba dive, quite a
boring one I might add, since there was absolutely no sea life in
sight… ;-)

Btw, I was not the only to feel as such since Wilko, the Dutch ex
commando diver and co runner also felt the same experience at night…



Food/ Liquid:
On the average, I consumed 4.5 litters of water per 20 kms which of
course added more weight on my back but definitely saved me from
dehydration.
I used the right combination of pasta/rice/ gels/bars/ cookies/
dates/ pain killers/ electrolytes and donated French saucissons
(from gracious other French racers…. ;-)) to make it through the
race. I obviously lost some weight by the end of the race, which is
in a way not a bad thing for me…



Pain:

I felt quite lucky since in comparison to other racers who endured a
large amount of blisters, I did not get very many of them.

A few points though:

Strangely enough, apparently the best shoes to wear in the desert
currently are the Gore-Tex made Sustina Montrail shoes. Even though
they are made for Alaska, apparently they don't retain too much heat
(according to another racer) and they barely take any sand with
their respective gators.
I was wearing some Vitesse Montrail which obviously takes too much
sand and heat up in mid day, to the point where I had to pour water
on them from time to time to cool them down.
Having said that, I believe that now a Touareg is happy to wear my
shoes in the desert that I left behind. These shoes and my prized
headlamp are now embarking on another career which most likely will
take them on a few more hundred miles of sand dunes….



Besides my feet, once in a while my right knee felt a bit weak but
this usually went away after absorbing a pain killer.

My back of course was a bit tired from time to time having to carry
this bloody back pack for 555kms with the heavy beacon, extra night
clothing, water, food, medical kit, etc… but this was not too
unbearable.



Nose bleed: a new one for all of us. Because of the great amount of
dust and sand we went through, most of our noses became plugged and
infected during the race, which became quite a bit uncomfortable.
Now, I fully understand why the Touareg nomadic people constantly
wear their chech around their face protecting their noses from this
violent dust ! Having said that, I must say that with the right
treatment of salted water, I was able to recover from this irritable
problem quite quickly after the race.



Finally, I did not have any stomach problems till strangely enough,
yesterday, one day after having returned from the race and
succumbing to a major case of turista…

======================