Racing The Planet: Vietnam – Stage 3 Update

vietnam logo new2
More updates today from the Racing The Planet: Vietnam stage race ultra this is currently going on in a remote region of that country. The conditions have been wet and cool up until this point, whic has made racing treacherous at times. In fact, yesterdays top finishers completed the stage in far more time than expected, leading the race directors to chop 18km off today’s route which is down from 48km to 30km.

Spanish runner Salvador Calvo continues to lead the pack with Felix Yiu Fai Shum of Hong Kong and Stephanie Case of Canada coming in at two and three respectively. Obviously Stephanie leads the female runners as well, and is really making an excellent showing for herself. In all, there are still 46 runners competing in the event, with five having dropped out for various injuries, none of which were too serious.

Tomorrow’s Stage 4 will see the racers running past rice paddies and through forests along what is deemed “small trails”. I’m interpreting that to mean narrow paths carved out of the jungle. The course will continue to wind through remote villages and will even cross an old suspension bridge before throwing some hills in at the end just to make the runners suffer a little along the way. The course is roughly 33km in length.

This is the first event sponsored by Racing The Planet which isn’t part of their 4 Deserts series. So far it sounds like it’s been a very challenging race, with cool and wet weather, making for tough going at times. Hopefully the event proves to be a big success for everyone involved, as it would be great to have more events like this one in unique areas of the World each year.

Kraig Becker

Comments are closed.