Fat, unfit and middle-aged – was I mad to take on a 99-mile Everest marathon? – Telegraph.co.uk

Keen to whip her body back into shape, adventurer Alice Morrison moved to the mountains to train for this year’s gruelling Everest Trail Race. It was far from easy

Lying on the couch, reaching for another Oreo, I surveyed my growing belly and decided enough was enough. Fat and unfit after a year of writing books and living more in my mind than my body, I needed a challenge to bring me back from the brink of middle-years surrender and found it: an ultra marathon around Everest. 

“That’s the thing,” I thought, and signed up. Immediately, I was flooded with a righteous glow and took to Facebook to acquaint an uninterested world with my greatness. It took about 24 hours for that glow to fade and the terror to creep in. A 99-mile (160km) run at altitude round the highest mountain in the world with 15,000 metres of climbing in six days, carrying my own equipment. What had I done? 

The race is organised by a group of Catalan ultra runners who were inspired to set a tougher challenge than the Everest Base Camp or trekking to base camp and one that takes you into pristine Himalayan trails, far from the overcrowding of Everest tourism.

I was living in a comfy home in Essaouira on Morocco’s Atlantic coast from where I was pursuing my career as a full-time adventurer. I’d come to Morocco five years before for another race, the Marathon des Sables, and liked it so much I stayed. In order to give myself the best chance of succeeding round Everest I knew that my idyllic beach life had to end. I couldn’t live at sea level and train on the flat for a high-altitude race in the mountains. 

I decided to move to Imlil in the Atlas Mountains where I could live and train at altitude and in conditions that would be close to those I would find in the Himalayas. I realise that some people may think I am odd, moving home to train for a race – but I am an all or nothing person. Living in the mountains was not just about the training, it was also a chance to live with the Amazigh (Berber) people and learn their language, Tashlaheet. 

Moving house is stressful for everyone, but I discovered that when you add mules into the equation it ratchets it up a notch. My new home was in a douar – a collection of houses in a kind of compound with a gate at the front and an open yard in the middle. Life in the douar is very traditional. My landlord had told me before I moved in, “No men, and no naked frolicking on the balcony.” I was flattered at his assumptions and, sadly, had no problem acquiescing. 

Training was my focus. When I explained what I was aiming for, the women thought I was crazy but they got it. I had to go from sub-zero to hero in just a few months, what’s more I was feeling the pressure of putting myself out there. If you sign your emails “adventurer” you have a lot to live up to, so I hired Andy Mouncey from as my online coach.

First on his list for building bombproof legs was weighted step ups. The only place to do them was outside my house, in full view of the douar. Mortifying, but I had to do it. I put on my Lycra, which is basically skimpy underwear in the eyes of my neighbours, loaded 10kg into my backpack and went outside. I got through 20, then I heard, “Alice, matnawilt? (what are you doing?)” and turned to see three girls watching. 

I explained, by which time all the kids had gathered, along with my landlady and her 90-year-old mother-in-law. Rather than telling me off for immodesty, everyone wanted to join in. I brought out all my weights, distributed them amongst the throng and off we went. 

Every day, training in the mountains rewarded me with new experiences: learning the names and uses of the herbs that hide in the rocks, getting on first name (and free tea) terms with the man who sells drinks at the top of Mizik Pass… and all the while building my strength.

There were, of course, moments (days!) of doubt. I would go out for 10 hours, climb something twice as big as Ben Nevis and come back exhausted, only to realise that if I did it that slowly come the race, I would be timed out and disqualified. I had sleepless nights thinking about the cut-off times – which are the maximum time you are allowed to get to the checkpoints set up during every stage of the race. Deeper than that, though, was the impostor complex that would pop up if I didn’t squash it down. I am not young or fit or thin. I was taking on something that would massively challenge anyone.

Then, suddenly, there was no time left and I was in Nepal, lining up at the start with 43 others. Imagine turning up for a 100-metre sprint and Usain Bolt stands next to you. Well, I had the equivalent with Jordi Gamito, who came third at that year’s UTMB, ultra running’s biggest race.

Standing there, ready to go under the arch, with the Himalaya ahead, everything clarified. I had only one goal: to finish within the time limits of every stage and not get disqualified for not making the cut-offs. Worry and self-doubt had no place. I’d had months of “you fool you are not good enough to do this” echoing through my brain. Now, I silenced those voices. There was no negotiation, I was going to succeed. There was only one possible outcome and that was to collect my medal at the end. But, before I got there, I had six days and six stages to get through, and they were fierce.

When you are carrying your own equipment for six days and running at high altitude you keep your kit minimal. Weight v warmth is the equation. I wore Lycra leggings, a top and a light jacket, with compression sleeves, a buff and a cap. No changes of clothes, but extra down layers for night when the temperatures plummeted and I had a -30C (-22F) sleeping bag. 

Head down, poles out, legs moving constantly. All I had to do was keep going. “Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,” I mentally chanted on the up, “Run the flats, run the downs, run the flats, run the downs,” was my mantra on the downs. Day two was the one I had been having nightmares about: 11,480ft of ascent, which is almost the equivalent of two Ben Nevises and a Snowdon straight up. There was no respite. We started climbing and then kept going for the next 10-and-a-half hours. The early part of the day was up through lush woodland, past tiny terraced farms. Tiny orchids and primulas peeked out from the green and occasionally a smell like lilies would flood my senses and lift my spirits.  

As day two wore on, the lush forest turned into a murder of crow-like blackened trunks with bare branches reaching out into the fog that was thickening around me. Eyes down, I focused on the path and shut my mind to all thought. I was trudging through a nightmare and I couldn’t allow myself to imagine an end to it. The temperature crashed into the minuses and the streams froze into pinnacles of ice and covered the path with treacherous sheets. At one point, I got down on my hands and knees and crawled rather than risk slipping.

One thing you can guarantee when you are doing this kind of challenge – when you think it can’t get any worse, it does. Darkness fell and I lost sight of the markers guiding our path. Then, eventually, it was over. Voices filtered through the foggy night and the finishing arch loomed. I was through, within the time limit, to a long bear hug from the race director, another Jordi. “Alice, it is an honour to have you with us.” I went straight to the mess tent and was greeted with cheers from my fellow runners. Last in, but I was a champion.

And that was the greatest thing about this race, the camaraderie. When you join a hard endeavour, you see human nature at its very best. People give everything they have to the effort, but they still have time for kindness and humour. All the annoyances of daily life don’t matter when measured against the mountains. 

Those mountains. The name Everest evokes romance, magnificence, wildness. The sky was the brightest of blues and we were very high so my breath was coming quickly on a long, rolling path cut from the side of the mountain. I was trotting along when suddenly the forest cleared and ahead I could see it, framed by the coloured flags of a Buddhist temple perched on the corner. White, snow-covered, reaching high into the blue. It was impossibly close and impossibly real. That was the moment for me, the moment that made all the training and doubt and suffering worthwhile. There was Everest and here was I, running the Everest Trail Race.

In that moment, I was super woman and everything was possible.