The Road to Mont Blanc pt.1

27th March 2025

 
It’s 15 weeks until I run the Tour du Mont Blanc – a famous, roughly 100-mile trail that circumnavigates the highest mountain in Europe – with my husband, Tim, taking us through France, Switzerland and Italy. I’m excited – and nervous! We’re doing it over six days, and while I know how many miles we have to run each day, I don’t know how long it’s going to take us, as the ascent is crazy. I might have bitten off more than I can chew.

I’m turning 40 this year and I’ve run regularly since my late 20s, but I had never done any big distances until last year, when I completed my first two ultras – 34 miles along the Pennine Way and 46 miles in the Lake District, including a summit of Skiddaw (distances considered ‘beginner ultras’ in the running world!). While I didn’t ‘smash’ them in any way, I had a pretty nice time, came sort of midway and didn’t feel too terrible at the finish line.

So this year’s goal is to run the TMB, making it to the hotels/huts before dark, not getting any buses, and not really struggling every day. And I’d like to have a nice time, too – I’m classing it as a ‘holiday’ and I’m picturing sipping cold beer in the sunshine each evening. So I think it’s time to get serious about the training now… especially as last night I struggled on a not-that-hilly 10 miler, while Tim and our dog, Arlo, had a brilliant time.

It should have been fine – I’ve done a couple of 15-mile runs as part of my training, and I often run 10 miles – but I felt rubbish. I was super tired and felt generally icky, and I definitely didn’t enjoy all the brambles, cow-trodden fields and giant mud puddles (one I almost lost my trainer in!). Runs don’t always go to plan, I know that, and I’m putting it down to an off day. So I’m hoping for a good long run this Saturday, with a rest day before. I’m aiming for 15 miles… then to the pub!

About me

Hello, I’m Laura. I’m turning 40 this year, and it’s over the last decade – since meeting my husband, Tim – that my love of the outdoors has really grown.

Gentle walks together in the Peak District, close to where I lived in Derbyshire, soon turned into big hikes, which took us to the Lake District, Wales and Scotland, too. It wasn't long before we were swapping our hiking boots for running shoes.

In 2021, we walked the West Highland Way over five days. It was the first multiday hike we’d ever done. There were blisters (mostly mine) and lots of learning curves, but it felt so good to have set myself a challenge and achieved it. Then last year we ramped things up with two ultramarathons (our first ever) – the Ranger Ultras PB55 (34 miles along the Pennine Way) and the 46-mile Grand Tour of Skiddaw in the Lake District, which included a climb up Skiddaw at the halfway point, which was hard!

It’s funny to think that we’ve done two ultras. I’m not from an active, outdoorsy family, and in terms of official running events, I’d only ever done a couple of road half-marathons and a few 10 Ks before. And I remember Tim calling 111 after I took him on his first ever run, not long after we’d met, as he thought ‘he might be having a heart attack’ – it was 4 km. 

Now, there’s nothing we love more than running for miles in the mountains – for me, that’s when I feel most at peace, most myself and most free. And the feeling you get afterwards – the exhaustion and exhilaration – is like nothing else.

So now for this year’s challenges – we’re planning to run the Tour du Mont Blanc in six days in July, then Edale’s Rings of Hell Ultra two weeks later. And the training has already begun…