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Portraits
Laurie
Andrews (465) and Michele Jensen (500), positive
Helder
Alexandre Sousa Ferreira (613), surprising
Desert
Team 22 (328, 329, 330, 331,332), focused
Ian
Sharman (821), motivated
Shigemi
Hazama (631), hilarious
Gilles
Diehl (141), modest
Mohamad
Ahansal (1), under pressure
Al
Aqra’ Salameh (71), ambitious
Jorge
Aubeso Martinez (622), zen
Touda
Didi (6), determined
Ryan
Gregory (526), hollywoodian
Sylvie
Alcala Bournat (187), serene
Stéphane
Lesoin (207), reliable
Louis
Cornevin (48), passionate
David
and Mark Simon (531 and 532), together
Paddy
Haddock (892), fishy |
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| The Chouchous |
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The Chouchous are back!
Stage 4 /
2nd day
Widy
is
a
star
in
Guadeloupe,
we
know
that,
but
up
to
now
we
didn’t
know
his
nickname: “Le
rasta
des
sables” – indeed,
more
and
more
people
from
his
native
island
have
been
taking
an
interest
in
the
Marathon
des
Sables
since
Widy’s
been
coming
here.
The
second
day
of
the
long
stage
is
a
restful
day
for
him.
He
came
23rd
after
a
9
hours
and
three
minutes
run,
which
makes
for
an
average
speed
of
8,33
km/h
!!!!
All
the
same,
it
wasn’t
an
easy
ride.
At
km
10,
the
front
pocket
of
his
back
pack
came
off
going
down
the
erg
El
Otfal,
which
means
he
had
to
run
the
remaining
65
km
holding
his
water
bottles.
But
Widy
is
not
so
easily
put
off
and
he
kept
a
good
pace,
overtaking
most
of
the
1st
departure
competitors.
Between
kilometres
39
and
46,
he
suffered
a
proper
lapse
of
energy
though
:
it
was
other
competitors’ friendliness
and
encouragements
when
they
recognised
his
dreadlocks
that
kept
him
going.
During
that
stage,
Widy
helped
out
another
competitor,
running
with
him
although
it
wasn’t
the
right
pace
for
him.
He
could
have
done
much
better.
But
you
know
Widy
by
now,
he’s
not
moaning
about
it.
On
the
contrary,
he’s
very
happy
about
his
heat
even
if
5
km
before
the
finish
line
he
felt
weak:
he
had
forgotten
to
eat
his
energy
bar – a
reminder
that,
at
this
level,
every
little
counts.
Widy
is
very
much
thinking
about
the
race,
but
he’s
also
thinking
about
his
bigger
project: “to
tread
the
earth
to
the
end
of
the
world”.
He’ll
be
running
in
4
types
of
deserts
in
2008
and
2009
:
Morocco,
Chile,
Egypt,
Gobie,
Death
Valley,
finishing
with
the
Antarctic.
He
hopes
a
good
ranking
in
the
MDS
will
get
his
some
generous
sponsors.
But
for
now,
the
priority
is
tomorrow’s
heat,
the
famous
42
km
Marathon.
Stage 4 /
1st day
The first wave of runners has just left
for their 75 Km epic stage, but Widy must
wait another hours to put up his own fight,
for that is when the 5 top women and the
50 top men at general ranking will be setting
off.
Widy is zen and smily as ever, despite
a rather poor night. Tired out from the
previous stage, he didn’t sleep
well. But what does our “chouchou” do
when he wakes up?
“ I run my body check list, I listen
to my biological clock, a bit like for
a car, checking the tyres, the radio
and so on. And most of all I talk to
my body, I’m kind to it.”
Widy
has no specific morning ritual: he has
a good drink of water and does
what his body tells him to do. If he
can feel a muscle being tense, he massages
it, strokes it, stretches it gently. “You
must talk to your body all the time,
tell your body you’re proud of
it, it will like it”.
While waiting,
he’s going to have
a good meal of carbohydrates!
***
We caught him at CP 4 (46,5 km along
the heat). He confessed he got tired
between CP3 and CP4, but other competitors
gave him so much encouragement he got
his morning legs back. He set off again
in great shape to complete the stage
in the evening.
Stage 3
« The desert smiled to me today
and I liked it » »
Widy is happy after that 3rd stage. His
16th rank brings him great satisfaction
as to be amongst the top 20 is for him “as
if [he] had won the race”. Today,
Widy comes 21st in the general ranking.
Once more, let’s try and get a few
tips from our coach – advice Widy
will only give with the greatest humility
since he’s only run 1,5 MDS so far…
He himself benefited from advice given
by old hands such as Karim Mosta (F-13),
who’s running his 20th MDS this year,
as to managing his food supplies and packing
his bag.
Widy regards alimentation as a key factor
and he reckons too many competitors do
not think carefully enough about this part
of their preparation. Ideally, according
to him, one should test food supplies 6
months ahead of the MDS on 6 to 7 hours
long walks to get a better idea of the
various tastes and, most of all, to make
sure such high energy food agrees with
one’s body. A lot of competitors
take too much food, making their backpacks
too heavy. Widy himself partly made that
mistake: he had brought biscuits for breakfast,
despite the fact his body found it difficult
to digest them. He now prefers to have
cocoa powder with a fruit and glucose cream.
Runners sharing his tent were happy to
eat the biscuits, and Widy was happy to
run with less weight.
Karim also taught him to have one bag for
each day, in the right order, so as not
to have to rummage, especially if it’s
a windy day (otherwise there’s always
the risk of loosing a crucial piece of
equipment)
On day one, food represented 70% of the
weight and 50% of the volume of his backpack.
Do not be fooled by his dreadlocks, Widy
is a supremely organised person, to the
point of obsession when it comes to the
race.
Tomorrow, we’ll be trying to spot
those famous dreadlocks on the 75km stage
to bring you more news of our “chouchou”.
Stage 2
We find Widy lying down in his tent
shortly after he finished today’s
38km stage. “It was flat, therefore
faster and more tiring, especially when
one’s fighting to keep one’s
ranking”. Widy ended up 22nd (and
6th French). If he keeps that pace, he
should reach his goal - to do better
than last year (i.e be amongst the top
25) – but there’s a long
way to go still and the stages to come
are full of surprises.
“
Trying to keep my ranking, I am very
focused, I don’t listen to any
music, I listen to the desert and most
of all to the race’s rhythm, and
I try to apply the strategy I decided
upon studying the road book.”
But of course Widy also thinks about
his island, his friends and their great
meals together, and about the big question: “why
do we put ourselves through so much pain???”.
Indeed, he has to cause himself suffering,
to push himself to the limit and to keep
his fingers crossed he won’t “break” anything.
Let’s make the most of talking
to our coach and get a few tips about
what to do when you’ve just finished
a heat. Widy :
- lies down and drinks lots of water
so that muscles can recover, he also
eats small salted nuts to compensate
for the day’s losses
- once he’s got some energy back,
he treats himself to a big bowl of hot
soup
- then he moves to something more serious
with a meal based on couscous, rice and
vegetables, for Widy is a vegetarian
(it takes 4 to 5 hours to get to that
stage)
- a last piece of advice: go to bed
early – one
needs to sleep at least ten hours to
be in shape the next morning, even if
the friendly atmosphere of the bivouac
makes it tempting to keep chatting and
sharing
During the race, on each stage, there’s
one moment Widy particularly looks for:
seeing the “23rd Marathon des Sables” sign
on the finish line. That means he can
move to top gear until he reaches it.
We’re far away from “cassaves”…
Stage 1
This year, all through the event, we’ll
be following the Rastafarian movement with
Widy Grego (F-314), who’s running
his 2nd MDS after ranking 25th last year:
a serious “client”.
Aged 46,
Widy is the youngest “manioc
worker” in Guadeloupe, his native
island. A great specialist of this tubercle,
he makes Guadeloupe’s best “cassave” (manioc
pancakes). Three times a week, he sells
his production on the market in St Anne.
He has a real passion for manioc and
his work, a family tradition, gives him
great pride. But Widy sets aside four
hours a day for his other passion: sport.
After winning all the island’s
raids, he decided to compete with the
best European athletes on various raids
in Europe, and then on the grail of ultra
raids: the Marathon des Sables.
25th last
year for his first go at it, he’s
now aiming for the top 20. To that end,
he has been training four
hours a day, split in two sessions (morning
and evening), alternating jogging, swimming
and general physical preparation. Which
means running between 20 and 40 km a
day.
But, true to his Rastafarian philosophy,
Widy shares his passion in the St Anne
Stadium. In the evening, he “coaches” young
athletes and all those in need of some
advice.
About a year ago, he met Luc Van
Den Avyle, a Belgium aeronautic engineer
working in Guadeloupe, who now helps
him with the coaching. Today, Luc is
wearing number 308 and is running his
first MDS. Sharing one’s passions
is fully part of a Rastafarian’s
philosophy.
Which is why everyday, we’ll be
sharing Widy’s.
Today he ended up
26th, running this 31,6 km stage in 3hours
and 27 minutes |
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Stage 4 / 2nd
day
Here’s our « Godfather»,
under tent 59, in top shape, surrounded
by his bodyguards.
He got to the bivouac with Joelle at 4.30
this morning after a 19 hours run, very
tired, but all’s well now. His only
worry is that Joelle’s got a blister
under a toe-nail. He’s beginning
to think about his friends coming to join
him at the end of stage 5. Joelle is already
freshening up! Jean-Paul has booked a table
in a restaurant boasting a swimming-pool
and… a berber tent, as if ten nights
of those in the desert weren’t enough.
Except this time he’ll be sharing
it with 35 people on top of his Legendre
tribe.
Team Legendre 1 suffered some casualties.
Gilles Diehl (F-141)’s sciatic nerves
started playing tricks on him again, but
despite the pain, he insisted on finishing
the stage, walking. Denis Callibot (F-142)
also had troubles. But Jean-Paul applied
the « 4x4 theory »: when one
tyre fails you, another one takes over.
And thus Team Legendre 2 is taking over
the 3rd position in the general team rankings.
They’re also doing well in the individual
rankings with
Albert Vallée (F-144), André Sicot
(F-146) and Yohan Serazin (F-143) in the
top 15.
But never mind that, Jean-Paul’s
main objective is to experience something
great and to enable others to share it
with him. Truly a god-father, in the noblest
sense of the word.
Stage 4 /
1st day
Jean Paul is smiling a large smile at the
starting line. He’s surrounded with
his wife Joëlle and with those of his
teams taking the early start. A sand wind
made it a difficult night but he remains
in great shape and looking forward to the
75 km ahead. In 2006, he’d had to give
up on the 3rd stage.
Tomorrow, we’ll meet the Legendres
again on their “rest” day at
the bivouac.
Stage 3
Could it be because they are our « chouchous » ?
In any case, teams Legendre 1 and 2 are now
3rd and 4th in the general team ranking.
Well done, guys!
Today, Jean-Paul and Joëlle have been
having a hard time. We spoke to them at CP
3 and you are welcome to eavesdrop…
Stage 2
Today, let’s have a closer look
at teams 1 and 2 of the big Legendre family,
the “cadors” – although
Jean-Paul wouldn’t like us to call
them so. He doesn’t want his athletes
to feel big headed.
On those two teams , we find 6 top athletes:
Gilles Diehl (F-141), Denis Caillibot (F-142),
Yohan Serazin (F-143), Albert Vallé (F-144),
Stéphane Grivel (F-145) and André Sicot
(F-146).Between them, they can boast 25
MDS and an average 6th place in the final
ranking!!!!
Each of them has his speciality: Gilles
was the best French runner under the reign
of the Ahansal brothers (getting twice
to the third rank); Albert is training
for the 100km French championship, to take
place in May; André is going to
give it all at the French Marathon Championship – with
Jean-Paul always supporting them.
For them, he’s more than a benefactor,
he’s a spectacularly generous man,
a real example.
Teams 1 and 2 were designed so that each
of them would have a strong contender for
the top three ranks – and also, why
not, win in the team category.
No personal ego : in Gilles Dielh’s
words, if the team ranking is good, the
individual ranking will be good too.
On today’s heat, Legendre 1 came
third and Legendre 2 fourth in the team
ranking.
Tank you Monsieur Jean-Paul for bringing
us such great and greatly modest competitors.
Stage 1
Also a « chouchou » is the bivouac’s
god-father. A god-father in the noblest sense
of the term.
Jean Paul Legendre (F-217) is
running the Marathon des Sables for the 4th
time
and each time he brings his gang.
In 2006,
he sponsored 3 teams ; this year, 5 teams
follow him.
Head of the Société Legendre,
a building company from Britany boasting
700 employees, he sets money aside for
sponsoring marathon and ultra-marathon
runners every year, because there are no
bad characters in those disciplines.
This
year’s forces are rather impressive,
in particular teams 1 and 2, with old hands
like Gilles Dielh (F-141), Lionel Eveno
(F-140), Albert Vallée (F-144) and
André Sicot (F-146) - the national
aristocracy of Ultra Trailing.
A fierce
fight has already started between those
two teams and most of the runners
are amongst the top 20 of today’s
stage.
Jean-Paul belongs to team 5 with
his wife Joëlle (F-140) and his brother
Gilbert (F- 219), amongst others.
Their main objective
is to enjoy themselves and safely get to
the finish line: they
had to abandon in 2006 and that’s
partly why they’re back this year.
For
Joëlle and Jean-Paul, coming
back to the Merzouga dunes is rather symbolic:
that’s where their honeymoon took
them in 1973.
Today, despite his sciatic
nerve, they ran the stage in 7 hours and
they’re
aiming for 8 ours tomorrow.
Our god-father
is happy amongst his friends and that’s yet another motivation
to this 4th MDS, “the fantastic spirit
of the bivouac”. To celebrate, all
the teams had an “aperitif” together
last night, with Corsican cold meats, some
wine and aniseed-flavoured liqueur.
Jean-Paul
is always surrounded by a big family in
his “marathonian outings”.
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