Ryan Sandes’ new book, Risk. Run. Reward., follows his extraordinary
ultra-trail running adventures since his 2016 autobiography, Trail Blazer.
It covers intense challenges like a 1,500-kilometre Himalayan journey
and a 700-kilometre solo run along Namibia’s Skeleton Coast, where he
encountered armed soldiers. Sandes also recounts his circumnavigation
of Lesotho with running partner, Ryno Griessel, battling local herdsmen.
Balancing a demanding career with family life, the book offers adventure,
humour, and insight into the psyche of an ultra-endurance athlete. These
tales push the limits of human endurance and survival in the world's
toughest terrains.
CHAPTER 1
A Couple of Tough Years
It was the middle of the night, high up in the Himalayas. Ryno and I were hiding, crouched behind the walls of an old ruin. Headlamps switched off so as not to give away our location. On the dirt road above us – part of a winding mountain pass – was a group of sketchy individuals with bad intentions. Bandits. They were peering intently down the barren mountainside trying to spot us in the moonlight and, at the very least, rob us.
This was not supposed to be happening. I mean … this was Nepal! Think Nepal, and what springs to mind is a peaceful, crime-free country of kindly monks wearing purple robes and wide smiles, right? Up until that point in our 1 500-kilometre run across the country, that had certainly been our experience. Obviously, not everyone was a monk, but the people living in this mythical, mountainous country had been beyond accommodating, friendly and helpful. Imagine knocking on someone’s door in South Africa at 3 a.m. asking for food and shelter. That’s if you get past the electric fence, alarm beams, the boerboel, the gun and armed response. A few times on that run, we might not have survived the night without the help of Nepalese villagers.
But now, crouching behind some ruins in the middle of nowhere, it looked very much like they wanted to kill us. Even Ryno Griesel, my running partner and friend, was starting to look a little panicked. Which really scared the hell out of me. It takes a lot for Ryno to look even vaguely worried about whatever challenging situation he might be facing, so for him to display some concern tripped every alarm at Panic Station Ryan. I was not in a happy place.
I will tell you more about our Himalayan adventure a bit later, but it’s a good entry point to another unhappy place, where my last book, Trailblazer, left off. Yes, 2015. As years go, that was a really shit one.
Two thousand and fourteen – now that was a good year. I’d won a couple of international races, finished second in the Ultra Trail World Tour, came fifth at Western States, set the fastest-known time (FKT) for the 209-kilometre Drakensberg Grand Traverse with Ryno, and Vanessa and I got married. May I also stress that this list is in no particular order of importance (love you, babe). One would think that that would herald the kind of momentum that would propel one into 2015. Turns out, not. Everything came crashing down. So much so that I genuinely thought my career was over. There were two reasons for this. First, in January 2015, I was diagnosed with glandular fever. The blood tests showed a dangerously low red-blood-cell count. I thought, ‘Okay, cool, I will just take it easy for a bit. I’m fit and strong and it will be over in a month, six weeks max. I can deal with this.’
Except it dragged on for the whole year. Every time I thought I was finally 100 per cent, something else would happen. Falling ill with food poisoning a day before the start of the Western States 100 in California was a prime example.
I dropped out of a number of big international races that year: Transvulcania in May, Western States in June and Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) in August. With this run of bad luck, I was genuinely contemplating whether I should call time on my career. By then, I’d already been in the game for eight years – a decent length of time for any ultra-trail-runner’s career.
Second, I was mentally fried. I’d pushed my body hard in 2014, which I was definitely paying a physical price for, but it was compounded by a deep mental exhaustion and a level of despondency too, if I’m honest. No one seemed to really understand the long-term effects of glandular fever, but I was reading about it online. Some articles said that you never really recovered from it, especially if you were an elite athlete. You might get better and seem fit and healthy by normal standards, but you could never get back to that high-performance level required from an elite athlete.
So, 2015 basically felt like one giant uphill treadmill. I was also completing my first book with Steve, and, generally speaking, athletes only write books when they’re at the end of their careers, right? I was pretty much ticking all the boxes required by the Standard Pro Athlete Retirement Strategy.
And then, not for the first time – as you will discover in these pages – Ryno saved me. In December 2015, he hauled my sorry arse off to the Drakensberg, where we spent a week hanging out and running together. By then, Ryno and I had become really good mates; he understands my thought processes. Ryno is a very positive and super-smart guy who is also meticulously organised. This trait allows him to remain calm in times of stress, and he is therefore someone whose opinion I value very highly. Yes, in many ways, we are total opposites.
“I was a professional athlete, it was how I made my living, but what was I going to do if I could not do that?”
The way in which we pack for an adventure illustrates our differences perfectly. My stuff will be in a huge pile next to my bag, while Ryno’s will be packed into labelled Ziploc bags, ready to be loaded into his luggage. In KwaZulu-Natal, we stayed in huts in a camp called Injisuthi in the northern section of the Giant’s Castle area, and we talked a lot about whether I should keep going with my career.
Ryno was super-encouraging, and at that point seemed to have more belief in me than I had in myself. That kind of positive perspective was a game-changer and a turning point for me. We started planning a few more projects that we could do together, the Great Himalaya Trail being one of them.
Along with Ryno’s advice, just geographically stepping away from my life and that mental treadmill made a huge difference to me. It kickstarted my recovery and, a month later, further blood tests indicated that my numbers were back to normal.
Looking back on that period now, the mental component was the biggest factor in arresting my recovery. Yes, physically I had been ill, but I had tried to force my recovery and was definitely putting too much pressure on myself. I was a professional athlete, it was how I made my living, but what was I going to do if I could not do that?
That pressure just built and built to a point where I was thinking, ‘Stuff it, I don’t care if I don’t run anymore.’ After Ryno’s Drakensberg therapy session, the pressure valve was released, and I could finally breathe again. Momentum began to build. It was an energy amplified by the news that I was going to be a dad. Vanessa was pregnant with our son Max, and we were about to embark on our very own special journey, one that I was 100 per cent ready for.
In January 2016, along with South African mountain-biker Bianca Haw, I was invited to participate in the Red Bull Defiance adventure race in New Zealand, a three-day, 160-kilometre multidisciplinary event. Bianca and I would be competing as a team in the mixed category. I did not do a huge amount of training for the event but mixing up the running with mountain-biking and a bit of paddling made for a lot of fun. There was no pressure, and physically I was beginning to feel really strong. Crucially, it looked as if my mojo had finally returned from its extended sabbatical. About flipping time, too.
Bianca and I had a great time competing together – I think I’m smiling in just about every photo. I even managed to not injure myself too badly, despite falling off the bike a few times on the downhills trying to keep up with my mountain-bike, whizz-kid race partner. We came third in the mixed category – not a bad result in what was quite a competitive field.
I felt strong during the event, and it bode well for my next race, which would also take place in New Zealand, 10 days later. The Tarawera Ultra-Trail is New Zealand’s premier trail event, held on the North Island along a beautiful but tough 100-kilometre point-to-point route from Rotorua through the redwood forests, hills and lakes to Kawerau. Vanessa flew over and joined me, which was even better for my headspace and, even though my leg was a little bruised from tumbling off the bike, I felt confident. A very … let’s call it ‘robust’ … massage from a Māori masseuse effectively released the muscles, though I did seem to end up with more visible bruising than I’d started with.
We had one stressful moment in the lead-up to the race. One morning, Vanessa joined me for a slow run, and afterwards I noticed a rash on her shoulder. She thought it was from some or other plant – possibly nettles – that she’d brushed against while running. We went to a local chemist, but when Vanessa pulled her shirt down over her shoulder, the pharmacist visibly recoiled, pointed and said, ‘Shingles!’
We were told to leave the premises and pay a visit to a clinic down the road. Naturally, this freaked us out – Vanessa was pregnant, and we had no idea what effect shingles could have on an unborn baby. While Vanessa waited in a long queue to see a nurse, I ran up and down the road outside with my cell phone above my head, trying to get a signal so that I could google ‘effects of shingles on an unborn baby’. When Vanessa finally did get to see a medical professional, it turned out that there was nothing to worry about. End of panic and my unplanned interval session on the street outside.
I woke up feeling weird on the morning of the race. I was slightly lightheaded, and my vision was a little fuzzy around the edges. Cue growing panic. I mean, give me a break … this felt like Western States all over again. Was it something I ate, or was it maybe just anxiety? I could feel myself getting increasingly wound-up. So, I chucked on my running kit and, at 3:30 a.m., in the dark, went for a trot around the Rotorua neighbourhood to see if I could clear my head. It worked. After 15 minutes, I was feeling way better, and I headed back to our Airbnb. Massive relief all round.
“I was in fourth place or thereabouts, feeling relaxed and running rhythmically,
but then I hit a rock or root and my ankle turned over a little.”
From there, it was back to my usual pre-race routine: coffee, some breakfast, and mobility and stretching exercises. With that angsty start to the morning behind us, Vanessa drove me to the starting line.
So, the race starts just outside Rotorua on the edge of the redwood forest, and conditions on the day were good – a light drizzle, but warm and a little humid. There was a cool vibe at the start with local Māoris performing the ceremonial haka war dance and playing Taonga pūoro instruments.
It was a relief to be at the start of another race, to be feeling good, and just to be running freely again. Obviously, I was shooting for the best possible result – at least a podium place – but my main goal was to get back on track mentally. Tarawera would be a personal test that would hopefully answer two crucial questions I had in my head: Had I properly recovered from glandular fever, and was I still the same calibre of athlete or had the illness permanently knocked 10 or 15 per cent off my abilities?
I knew this would be a fast race, as the course was relatively flat along fast and flowy single-track mountain-bike trails. In the field were the likes of Sweden’s Jonas Buud, who had placed second at Comrades a few years earlier, Aussie speedster David Byrne, and Japan’s Yoshikazu Hara, who had won a whole lot of 100-kilometre road and trail races in Japan. My competitive goals were in place, but, more importantly, I wanted to feel good during the race. I wanted to run without that heavy feeling in my legs that had seemed to plague me throughout 2015. I missed that sensation of a flowing, effortless run, and I wanted it back.
I felt calm at the start and ran a smooth and controlled race. There was one little moment of concern when I half-rolled my ankle. I was in fourth place or thereabouts, feeling relaxed and running rhythmically, but then I hit a rock or root and my ankle turned over a little. Luckily, it wasn’t too bad, but it was a timely reminder not to get ahead of myself. If I lost focus, it could all be over in a split second. One step at a time, Ryan! Don’t think about the podium now – just focus on getting to the next aid station, where Vanessa will be ready to stock you up with supplies.
At around the 30-kay mark, I moved into third place and basically stayed there for the rest of the race. The final 40 kays were on a fast, flat jeep track, and the athletes would run this in sub-4 minutes per kay, which is fast by trail-running standards. That’s not my strength, and I did not have the pace to catch Jonas, who won. But I was running smoothly and feeling relatively fresh, and I was catching up with David for second place.
Listening to the spectators on the trail, I knew I was being chased down by Yoshikazu, so I felt some pressure, but I managed to hold it together. Although I could not catch David, who finished eight minutes ahead of me, I managed to come home third in 8h30min. I was really happy with the result.
Two years earlier, I might have felt more disappointed for not having won, but after 2015’s challenges, a drama-free and comfortable podium finish in a fast 100-kay race was a win for me. I thought it was a positive step forward, and even the media announced: ‘Ryan’s back!’ It felt good. My career was back on track.
After all my did not starts (DNS) and did not finishes (DNF) in 2015, I’d been the recipient of some negative comments on social media. Some people said that they dreamt of getting an entry to Western States or UTMB, so how could I drop out of these races? They would have crawled over the finish line. I acknowledged the criticism, but I don’t think they understood that this was my career and I had to manage my body properly. If you are an amateur and you have managed to gain entry to, say, Western States, then I fully understand that you would do all you could to finish, as it would probably be the one and only time you would run in this event.
As a professional athlete, though, there are only so many ultradistance races you can run competitively, and it made no sense for me to crawl over a finish line and risk permanently damaging my body. When my elite athlete days are over, I would love to go back to Western States and experience it at a slower pace. Fortunately, I have grown a thick skin over time and, although social media comments still get to me sometimes, I have learnt to mostly ignore them.
What we could not ignore was Vanessa’s increasing morning sickness and we had to get back to South Africa sooner rather than later. Back home, I was now in a great headspace. I knew that I still had the ability to compete, Trailblazer was about to hit the shelves and, best of all, I was about to become a dad. I was feeling great, and I hoped that the Tarawera result would set the scene for a great 2016. Bring on UTMB.
Extracted from: Run. Risk. Reward. by Ryan Sandes with Steve Smith, out now.
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