Cape Town trail athlete, Daniel Claassen, got South Africa’s challenge at Ultra-trail Mont Blanc of to an impressive start yesterday (26 August) when he finished fifth in the 152km TDS race – the first non-French athlete home in the French alpine town of Chamonix.
1,394 runners got underway shortly before midnight, from Courmayeur, Italy, and would climb 9000m of vertical ascent before their race ended in Chamonix.
French athlete, Antoine Charvolin (ON Trail), broke the tape at the 92-mile TDS event in Chamonix with a time of 18:22:17, less than six minutes ahead of an emotional Gautier Airiau (Scott Meribel) with a third French runner, Leo Rogaume (Annecy Athletisme) third in 18:39:21.
Another French athlete, Matis Leray (Mizuno), finished in fourth position, just ten minutes ahead of Claassen (adidas SA).
Charvolin, 27, stepped up in distance this year after a 13th-place finish at the UTMB CCC 100km last year and ran strongly from the outside, leading the field through the first check-point at Checouit-Maison Veille 8km into the race.
Apart from the climb to Col Chavannes at 21km, where he fell back to fourth, Charvolin was never out of the top three, finally taking charge of the race before the Barrage De La Girotte checkpoint 111km into the race and kept his lead to the finish, holding off the fast-finishing Airiau, who closed almost 20 minutes on Charvolin in the final 20km.
Claassen ran his customary disciplined race, starting conservatively before powering through the field in the second half to take the final podium position, 11 minutes clear of top Spanish ultra-trail athlete, Pau Capell.
Barely in the top thirty through Arete du Mont-Faver, 12 km into the race, Claassen had moved up to 15th shortly before halfway at La Gittaz and the top ten at Hauteluce just past the 100km marker. He reached fifth position just over 12km from the finish and finished in triumph in his best-ever result at international level.
After 22 hours of running, Belgian athlete Hélène Dassy (Compressport Benelux) held a 49 minute lead over Chinese athlete Xueer Shang in the women’s race through Col de Tricot, 20km from the finish.
