IT APPEARED the height of folly. But a happy band of Hong Kong adventurers hit such a high while running a race in the Himalayas this month, they celebrated by giving a kung-fu show. The impromptu 'high five' came amid the five-day 160-kilometre Himalayan Stage Race above the tea estates of Darjeeling in India. The tortuous trail included the Mount Everest Marathon, described as the most beautiful - and one of the toughest - distance races in the world.
The celebration after the marathon leg of the annual race was just one of the high points for Hong Kong's five entrants in an event organised by Himalayan Run & Trek, that had runners gasping with delight and for breath.
For many, traversing rocky roads and mountain trails at 3,700 metres - nearly half the height of Mt Everest - at times must have felt like running with a yak on their backs, but Hong Kong's quintet happily made it to the finish amid entrants from Britain, Austria, the United States, Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands.
For me, it was the highlight of more than 30 years of running that included completing South Africa's 90km Comrades Marathon, a couple of 56km Two Oceans ultras and seven standard marathons - all in the mid-1970s. The trouble was I hadn't run a marathon in 25 years and taking on the Himalayas at the age of 62 - the oldest competitor in the race - proved a daunting challenge. I finished third last in 37th place after 36 hours and 43 minutes on the trail.
When I read about the race during a break two years ago in Kathmandu, Nepal, it looked a 'hill' too far. Running 160km at altitude was unknown territory for me. But the idea of all that beauty and competing in the Mt Everest Marathon in the third leg of the stage race was tempting. So I started training last November, inspired by the Chinese proverb, 'A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step'. Much later, with 1,600km of training behind me, I stood shivering in the early morning mist at the start of the race in the small Himalayan village of Maneybhanyjang.
We made a diverse bunch. There was Mike Wardian, an American who eventually won the Mt Everest Marathon and stage race in record time; Stefan Schlett, a German extreme sports specialist who had run the 4,723km Trans-America race; and a smattering of other athletes whose only goal was to make it to the finish alive. I was delighted other Hong Kongers were in the race, including Grace Wu Kar-yee, 30, a London-based business consultant whose parents live in the SAR; Americans Alice Rosen, a 27-year-old viola player with the HK Philharmonic, and her husband Ben Pelletier, 29, who works for RTHK; and Briton Rex Whittle, a 61-year-old engineer with a Kwun Tong firm.
'You're running up that mountain,' the race director informed us. 'You go up about 1,800 metres and it's 38 kilometres mostly uphill. Some of the slower runners might finish in the dark, so take a torch to find the way.'