August 25, 2025

04: TDS/UTMB, love for the trees, and a contest

Introduction

What do you hear, in the blowing of the wind? What do you see, in the swaying of the trees? What does the ibex on the ledge, by the crumbling rocks, want you to know? Can you be present enough when, for a moment, you wish for it to be over? You can be enough, enough, enough. - AF 

It’s UTMB Race Week! 

We’re returning to Chamonix with our own unique challenges and many layers of goals this year: Adam is running les Traces des Ducs de Savoie (TDS) and Kelsey is returning for her third Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc (UTMB). TDS starts at 11:50pm tonight/Monday local time (5:50pm ET) in Courmayeur, Italy and finishes 148km later in Chamonix, France. UTMB starts Friday evening at 5:45pm local time (11:45am ET) and covers 176km through France, Italy, and Switzerland. Both races have nearly 10,000m of elevation gain and take runners through technical and remote alpine terrain.

TDS

There are wooden stairs that lead to my room in the chalet. This afternoon I took them one at a time, balancing a pot of tea, wishing for each one to reveal something about how I’ll feel at the Passeur de Pralognan or Col de Tricot during TDS. I checked my hip flexors earlier as I wandered across the square towards the gelato stand at the finish line of the UTMB. Someone — soon I’m sure — will tell me that it’s okay to focus on running and this chosen challenge. Yet, for what it’s worth, I see other challenges that call for my attention. I’ll be back once I’ve seen this through. - AF

TDS // 155km // 9000m elevation gain

Starts Monday, August 25 at 11:50pm local time

Follow Adam’s progress on LiveTrail (Bib #9168)

UTMB

The start line music plays and invites me to find a moment of quiet-calm, to tune into my emotions, the beating of my heart, and the feeling of the ground beneath my feet. UTMB is known for its electric-energy, huge crowds and deep competition…but it also offers moments for curiosity, self-reflection and time alone on mountain peaks among the stars. I crossed the finish line at last year’s UTMB and felt like I still had more to learn from this race (I wrote a little about that in this post), so I’m back this year with many layers of goals, putting more of the puzzle pieces together and feeling ready for a faster, stronger finish. I’m grateful to be able to do what I love thanks to a whole village of people including my crew, norda Trail Team, brand partners, supporters, friends and family. - KH 

UTMB // 176km // 10,000m elevation gain

Starts Friday, August 29 at 5:45pm local time

Follow Kelsey’s progress on LiveTrail (Bib #234)

How to follow the races:

• Follow @kelseypamela / @adamfearnall on Instagram // our crew will be updating via Instagram throughout the race, so this is going to be the best place to find live content from our team.

• Visit UTMB Live // this is your go-to page for everything to do with the race. You can “favourite” runners, check out the map, and watch live race coverage. If you prefer to watch the coverage on YouTube, visit this link. 

• Join Kelsey & Adam’s Crew chat on Telegram // this is the place to talk about the race with other trail running fans. It’s also a good place to troubleshoot if you’re having trouble understanding how to follow the race. The crew at the race will be sharing some behind the scenes stuff and answering questions here. 

• Download the LiveTrail App on mobile // this is the phone app version of UTMB Live (mentioned above) and basically provides the same information.
  

CONTEST // Predict Our "XACT" combined time at TDS & UTMB to win a prize pack!

We’ve both been long time users of XACT Nutrition and wanted to give you a chance to try out their products and have some fun with our upcoming races, so we reached out to Lawrence Colsell, a Co-Founder of XACT, and he agreed to support a contest for our newsletter subscribers and supporters. 

We want you to predict our combined time at TDS and UTMB: send us a message with your guess for our combined total time (Kelsey’s UTMB time on course + Adam’s TDS time on course) and the closest to the actual result will win a prize pack of products from XACT! 

How to enter: Reply to this email with your guess on our total combined time, in the format of hours:minutes:seconds. That’s it! We’ll contact the person who’s guess was the closest to our actual combined time and arrange to have your prize package delivered to your address (shipping to Canadian residents only). The deadline for submissions is Tuesday, August 26th at 2:00pm CEST / 8:00 am EST — 14 hours into Adam’s race. 

Crew Appreciations

• Kelsey’s parents, Jane and Noel, are back for a third straight year of UTMB crewing. Lori, our mental performance coach and friend, is back for her second year. New to the crew this year are Kelsey’s brother, Riley, and our friends from Fredericton, Kelli-Nicole and Steven. They’ll be crewing both TDS and Chamonix this year, so it’s a big job. Everyone is familiarizing themselves with bus routes, gelato stops, aid station routines, and nap opportunities. We’re grateful for each of their contributions to the crew!

• A quick note on Kelli-Nicole and Steven. We put out a last minute call to ask for people to fill out some extra roles on our crew and weren’t sure if we’d find anyone. Much to our surprise and joy, Kelli-Nicole and Steven managed to swing a last minute flight to join us. We’re so glad to have them here and appreciate that they were willing to jump in with all of their feet!  

• Claire & Jean-Marc (and their dogs, kitten, horse, and pony) hosted us for 10 peaceful days at their apartment in Les Frasserands so that we could rest, run, acclimate, and scout the course. 

• The Backtrails by Radical Edge crew (Kaylee, Mary, and the whole team) made sure we had the gear, nutrition, and hugs we needed ahead of our travels.

• Chai Kennels (Lisa and the Ross family) are caring for Ralph while we’re away. Knowing he’s looked after and enjoying time with his other furry friends helps us to be present here, although we both miss him a lot!

• Katheryn Cochrane, with M2M coaching, coached us both through this training block and created individualized structure and specificity to help us prepare for our races. Katheryn is running 100km at the STEEP Ultra in Corner Brook, NL at the beginning of September — we’ll be cheering her on from a distance! 

• Melissa Allen helped us dial-in our nutrition and hydration plans, including meeting us in Halifax last month to do a sweat test (fun fact: Kelsey is a saltier sweater, but Adam sweats more!). 

Sharing some links

📚 We’ve been reading Alex Hutchinson’s latest book, The Explorer’s Gene: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavours, and the Blank Spots on the Map. We’re both enjoying it and recommend it, along with his first book, Endure.

🔔 To get a little window into what crewing a UTMB race is like, check out this piece Lori wrote about supporting Kelsey’s race last year (including baby cow stories and sport psychology takeaways from a first-time crew member).

🎂 In July, we spent two weeks on the west coast of Newfoundland with our families to celebrate Adam’s parents — Bruce and Barb — on the occasion of their 130th birthday (they both turned 65 this year!). When we weren’t eating or taking boat rides, we made the most of training days in Gros Morne National Park, Humber Valley Trails, and Marble Mountain.

📣 The news is out in the local trail running community, but we wanted to tell all of you that we’re the new Race Directors for next year’s Dark 50 trail race. Our friends Jos Eijkelestam and Noortje Kunnen have built a great trail running series in Fredericton under Dutch Viking Events, and we’re honoured to have received the Dark 50 torch (headlamp?).

Sharing some love with the forests

Our hearts are with the people (and forests, flora, and fauna) who have been affected by fires throughout Atlantic Canada and other parts of the world this year.

After weeks of restrictions on recreational activities in forests in response to the risks posed by wildfires, we’re celebrating with our trail-loving friends the news that “the woods are open again” in New Brunswick tomorrow.

Restricting access to the woods might have been the only response available to our governments and communities this time around, but we have the energy and the optimism to get to work on more creative responses so that we can keep people connected to the woods and keep our firefighters and communities safe during the next wildfire season. We hope that we can balance protecting forest ecosystems without sacrificing opportunities to deepen our connection with them.

While we’re running through mountains and forests here in the Alps, we recognize the ancient wisdom in the tall trees around us. They seem to share their care and love with us, even when we aren’t quite sure how to honour them in return. 

Sending our love to the trees, and to you.

-Kelsey & Adam

Add your comment here...