Legionary Rui Manuel Da Silva Viegas, ready to fight

Rather tall, fully tattooed on both arms, short and grey haired, Rui Manuel Da Silva Viegas (140, Fr), 61 years old and a former legionary, is ready for a good fight with the Sultan Marathon des Sables and the Moroccan desert. Neither the heat nor the weight of his back-back scare this pensioner who lives near Castelnaudary (Aude, France). “I spent two years in French Guiana where we used to race under a leaden sun and with a ruck-sack full of stones. So the weather conditions certainly won’t get the better of me.” All the more so as Rui Manuel, of Portuguese roots, has been training for all sorts of terrains. He has often been spotted running on the beach, hours on end, with a 15 kg back-pack. He’s also been doing frequent “small runs”, as he likes to call them, of 40 km. He’s not afraid of repetitive effort either: “Running over 30 km day after day doesn’t scare me. It’s a question of habit. And of mental strength..” And our man certainly is mentally strong. Although he doesn’t clearly state it, he is aiming high: he wouldn’t mind finishing amongst the first of his age range. Look for the answer 250km down the line.