After 21 competitors died during a 100km mountain race in Gansu province, the Chinese government last week suspended all extreme sports. But those who love ultrarunning insist it can be safe – and has changed how they see the world. What keeps them coming back?
To most people, the horror of 21 lives being lost during a race across 100km in a Chinese mountain range will have been amplified by how obscure the sport seems to outsiders. But ultrarunning has boomed in popularity in recent years, with the number of finishers around the world rising from 120,000 to more than 600,000 in a decade. Now there are concerns that in China and beyond, a proliferation of new races has created a risk that safety rules will not always be enforced, and with it a chance that some of the most obsessive participants will discard vital protective equipment in the interests of gaining an advantage over their rivals.
Rachel Humphreys talks to Outside magazine’s Will Ford about the tragedy in China, and whether the decision of the government there to ban all extreme sports is the right response. And she hears from the author and ultrarunner Adharanand Finn about the extraordinary appeal of this brutally difficult feat of endurance – and how any analysis of its dangers must sit alongside an understanding of its power to change its devotees’ lives in profound ways.
