Blizzard, whiteout and insanity. Zamieć 2019 race report [PHOTOS]

Push on! These words flowing in my veins
Have a little war inside me

[Lady Pank – Mała Wojna (Little War)]

Skrzyczne, 27 January, 2:30 am. I leave the hut, run down the turnaround and throw myself down the Wuthering Heights for the fourth time. The wind is blowing as never before. Or maybe like in 2015. Back then the blizzard blew the footprints over too, but now there's also a total whiteout. I run down the hill the way I like, e.g. fast. In my headlamp I can only see the fog and snowdrift, all that with maybe 3-metre visibility. Only sometimes I can discern a blinking marking light or a reflective tape. A few minutes later I take a fall into the snow just before the edge of a cliff. Really would prefer not to fall down there. I must have left the course. Gotta get back up, just don't know how far.

* * * * *

Forecasts proved correct

Szczyrk, 26 January, 12:00 pm. It's always good to meet fellow nutters. There is no better place for it than the amphitheatre below the ski jumping hill on the last Saturday of January at high noon. We set off up the snowy boulevard along the Żylica river. This is already my fourth Zamieć. Yeah, this race is called Blizzard. 24 hours of running on a loop of ca. 14 km with 900 vertical metres from the town to the summit of Skrzyczne (1257 m a.s.l.) and back.

A while later I painfully hit the ground with my hip. It was not supposed to be slippery, just heaps of powdery snow, so I left the spikes in my dropbag. And indeed it will not be, except for the start and finish bits on each loop...

A single file of racers walks up the path broken in the snow. Broken, big deal. You can't break a path in this powder. And more snow keeps falling from above. The first loop is always a nice warm-up and chinwag with friends. It's already the third time here for Chloe. Mervyn is a rookie, like most of the foreign bunch. In a varying line-up they've shown up here since the beginning of Zamieć. It's always fun to hear them try to pronounce Szczyrk and Skrzyczne.

That's Szczyrk, a town in Beskidy
No Belgian can pronounce it unless his teeth are gritted
The creme de la creme of the ultra world in a
Show with everything but Kilian Jornet

I drop them on the downhill just before the safety net that protects the ski piste. We climb up the crest where the wind is picking up, just like all the forecasts predicted. I reach the top of Skrzyczne in two hours and a dozen or so minutes. Never been so slow, but also never been so much snow. When I leave the hut, Marta just comes in. It's her first ultra race. Jarek, another one from our crew, is even better – he chose this as his first ever fell race. Good choice, innit...

Just before the last little col I see a slowly walking racer wrapped in a rescue blanket. He seems to be injured but has company and looks safe. I hit the end of the loop at 3h24. Even in the powdery snow two years back it took me three hours sharp, and in the last "spring" edition it was 2h11 without any hurry. Experience however shows that every single Zamieć is different and it's more or less useless to make any assumptions as to the number of loops before the start. I don't stop even for a while. Just unwrap a chocolate bar and start chewing it while walking up the boulevard to start loop two.

Time flies, doesn't seem a minute
Since the Beskid Cinema had the running boys in it
All change, don't you know that when you
Race at this level, there's no ordinary venue

It's Mont Blanc or Lavaredo
Or Hardrock or, or this place

Wuthering Heights

The field is already well scattered by now and most of the time I yomp alone. Only sometimes I'm being overtaken by faster racers who had decided to take a rest at the HQ. Since the beginning of the climb I've been slowed down. The steep traverse still feels alright but the long, neverending hairpins in the falling darkness are slowly getting on my head. The rut broken in the deep snow is filled with powder on which you can't normally run or even walk. Just before reaching the crest I light up my headlamp. At least the blizzard has eased a wee bit. My split time at the top is even more pathetic.

The open downhill section is however exposed to the wind and blizzard as usual. Wuthering Heights, as I start calling it. I overtake a dozen or so racers, even though my legs give way in this powdery snow. Just one runner somehow keeps up. I only let him go at the flat section, when my quads are burning and I'm out of breath. – Got spikes? – I ask. He needn't reply, I can see the gear on his shoes in the light of my lamp.

As it turns out, even in those conditions microspikes can come in handy. When it comes to gear, I've been wearing my walking boots and gaiters right from the start. I'd known there wouldn't be much running anyway, and when it comes to downhills, I can do them even in fins. At least my feet are dry. My own Zamieć spoof of "One night in Bangkok" by Murray Head springs to mind again...

One race's very like another when your balls are warm and your feet dry, brother

If you don't climb it, that would really be a shame, this mountain with an unpronounceable name

The next steep downhill has already developed steep ruts, so I just slide down on my feet. Both long flats in the dark are just hard on your brain, only the short vertical between them gives some break. The shorter racers will probably get neck-deep in the snow gorge that formed at its beginning. Two clicks before the end of my second loop I meet a runner who's feeling really sick. Better not leave him alone, so I stay with him right to the HQ. One has to be a gentleman once in a while. Together we pass a party bunch at a bonfire who will be cheering us till late night.

I've already mentioned I'm into making up lyrics while pushing on. The Polish band Nocny Kochanek, who make brilliant spoofs of the metal genre themselves, will become my target on the next climb. I'll even sing it at the most tedious bits...

Gentlemen of Zamieć, Skrzyczne by night is the shit
Gentlemen of Zamieć, broken nose on the downhill bit
Gentlemen of Zamieć, isotonic, sweat and blood
Gentlemen of Zamieć, will be yomping all night long

Those couple minutes don't really matter, especially that I need some rest myself too. At the last downhill we both take falls within a minute. It only confirms my decision to put the spikes on for the next loop.

Rebirth?

Being so slow, I realistically estimate my result at five loops. Won't be getting any faster for sure, and to do six I would have to keep the same speed as before. I'm generally feeling weak. My good shape from last summer and autumn is long gone. After the race of my life at the Hell of Czantoria I had to quit running for a month to give my knees a rest and it's been a downward slope since then. I was out of shape at the New Year's training camp in the mountains, and besides that I haven't run that much recently.

After two loops without a break I give myself less than half an hour to eat and drink. Bullion, tomato soup, pasta with meat and vegetarian stuff – I grab whatever grub I can. I fill my flask with cola and a pocket thermos with hot tea. Thanks to it on my loop three I'm feeling much better. Maybe thinking about a personal intention while running only helps the runner, or maybe not, I don't know. It's not really about religion, more like faith. I wish it helped not just me.

Even the long hairpins somehow go easily this time. My poles often get stuck in deep snow but are still of help. At the top I take a gel and chocolate bar. Now armed with microspikes, I run all the downhills like crazy, especially that just below the summit the snow becomes frozen. Even the mentally tiring long flats pass quickly and I finish this loop in 3h40. Not bad at all. Going for six?