In the closing stages of the 100k CCC race in the Alps this year, Kay Lewis realised she might be crushing a few egos. Her race plan had focused on managing her energy to finish “with dignity”.

While others were fading, if anything, Kay was getting stronger.

“I actually felt a little bit mortified at times, because I'd run past people, and they'd be strapping young men in their 30s, and I could see them thinking, ‘That's my mum. That's my mum passing me!’” she says.

It wasn’t just the egos of strapping young ultra runners that were being crushed. Kay was doing the same thing to her race plan, on her way to finishing third in her age bracket in a finishing time of 21 hours, 8 minutes and 46 seconds.

She was able to do this because she’d trained with intent and devised a race day strategy she executed almost flawlessly.

This was a “revenge run” for Kay - she’d had to drop out in her first attempt at CCC in 2023. This time around, she was leaving nothing to chance, preparing meticulously. She had a 20-week training plan from Evoke Endurance that was race-specific.

It focused on building running endurance through low heart rate training, and strength endurance through drills designed specifically for runners. This numbers-based approach also influenced Kay’s race-day planning.

To capitalise on the work she’d done building her aerobic base, Kay was determined to moderate her effort to stay in zones one and two during the race. This meant a maximum heart rate of 146 beats per minute.

Kay says a “hard science” approach appeals to her, and having a plan and sticking to it is motivating. “I like to feel satisfied that I've done everything - tied everything up nicely. That I've done a good job,” she says.

Her experience DNFing at the 54k mark in 2023 also played its part this time around. “I was training for the back half, because that's what I hadn't done last time.”

That, of course, means not going out too hard. But CCC presents a dilemma on this front because it’s a large field with a natural choke point at about the 5k mark. Kay was tempted to push a little harder in that opening stretch so as not be be delayed.

Then a couple of days out from the start she heard a podcast interview with Scott Johnston, one of Evoke’s top coaches and the man who coached both Ruth Croft and Tom Evans to wins in the UTMB finals last year.

Johnston’s message was simple - don’t let your ego ruin your race day. “And I was like, nope, I'm sticking to my watch [and the 146bpm limit],” she says.

For those new to the UTMB experience, just getting to the start line can be exhausting. CCC starts in Courmayeur and finishes in Chamonix. Many runners stay in Chamonix and rely on busses to get to the start line.

This adds time and an extra layer of stress to proceedings, both things Kay was keen to avoid. So she stayed in Courmayeur the night before the race. The weather on race day, despite being clear and sunny in the lead-up, was rainy so this decision meant Kay didn’t spend three or four hours standing in the rain waiting for the race to start.

Another trap for young players at this event is being over-stimulated by the carnival-like atmosphere at the start line. The crowds are like nothing else in the trail running universe, reminiscent of the Tour de France.

Some push back against this hoopla, but Kay says a better approach is to lean in. “I've always said to people, ‘You're going for the circus, embrace the circus.’ You can't get there and go, ‘Oh, I hate this. There are too many people.’”

Kay says despite the fact the event has become bigger than Ben Hur, she feels it’s retained something of a “family run” vibe. Founders Michel and Catherine Poletti are still heavily involved - Michel ran UTMB with his grandchildren this year - and their daughter Isabelle Viseux-Poletti is the race director.

Race organisers also go out of their way to acknowledge volunteers - and Kay saw this first-hand. This year the official starter for CCC was Robert Etellin, a Chamonix local who’s been volunteering at UTMB since the first event back in 2003.

He’s now in his 90s and is a familiar part of the UTMB furniture, famous for his floppy felt hat and the cow bells he uses to cheer runners on.

When the race started, Kay resisted the temptation to get out in front of at least some of the crowd, and stayed as strictly as possible in zones one and two - ensuring her heart rate only rarely exceeded 146bpm.

This proved to be remarkably successful. “When I look at my stats… I spent 55 per cent of the race in zone one. So I was in recovery for more than half of the race!” she says. “It didn’t really feel like it, but at the same time it never felt hard.”

She puts this down to the training regime. “There’s the two components - the aerobic base and the muscular endurance… My legs just didn’t get tired. Which seems bizarre.” There was nothing complicated about the approach. “It was pretty simple. I think that’s the thing: it is so simple!”

That strength work unlocked a couple of superpowers that really paid dividends for Kay. Not only was she out-performing others hiking the uphills, she was also in the overtaking lane on the downhills.

“The first climb is 14k and as soon as we started going downhill, that’s when I realised I was in my element because I was just passing people,” Kay says.

But it was in the second half of the race that all that training and her determination to stick to her race-day strategy really paid off. She was able to crush egos because she’d managed her energy with a view to running the back half of the race well, and finishing with dignity.

Apart from the plan to remain in zones one and two, Kay set herself one additional goal. “At 83k … there’s a gradual climb out of the aid station for about 3 or 4k. It’s definitely runnable when you’re fresh, but it’s one of those where you think, ‘I might walk this.’

“Before the race I thought if I could run that, then I’d know I’d managed everything well. So I think it was about 1 o’clock in the morning and I’m running along having a little laugh to myself thinking, ‘I’m doing it! I’m doing it.’”

It wasn’t as though it was all plain sailing during the race either. The weather, while not as diabolical as in 2025 when the trails resembled creeks, was still bad enough that Kay and the CCC field had to contend with two course diversions.

One of these diversions, which came in the last part of the race, sounded promising to begin with, but turned out to present its own challenges. Kay only found out about this change because she was chatting to a fellow runner at an aid station.

“He said he was pulling out because he didn’t want to get wet - at that stage it was pouring down again. He said he was over the rain, ‘I’ve done this race before, I don’t need to do it again.’

“Then he said to me, ‘Do you know about the next diversion?’ And I’m like, ‘You what?’ He said, ‘Yeah, yeah - at the end, instead of going right up to La Flegere, you’re going to do the diversion that the race the day before did.’

“And I’m thinking, ‘Oh, that’s good because that’s not a hill. We’ll just be going along the bottom of the valley.’ So I was kind of happy about that.”

One thing you can rely on in trail running though: things don’t always go how you expect them to. “Then we get to where we should, theoretically in my mind, be going along the bottom of the valley and we start going up the big hill.

“That threw me a little bit mentally. I was like, ‘I have no idea what’s going to happen from here. Because if we’re not going over the top, how do we get back down?’

“Turned out we nearly got to the top, we were about 1k short. Then they took us down a trail that was soft and loamy under pine trees, so really soft pine needles that you slide on.

“There were no switchbacks, so it was straight down. Our feet were just going out from under us. Afterwards I dug out the stats - it was a 33 per cent grade downhill. So it was steep for nearly 1k.”

Earlier, the fog had been so bad Kay could barely see 20m in front of her. “There’s an orange life hut that they have at the top of the Grand Col Ferret … and it just popped up out of nowhere.

“Going down the other side I came across a group of people coming up. The first one had these big wheels on his back and I was like, ‘That’s a bit odd.’ The next one was carrying a long, skinny thing.

“It transpired it was like a wheelbarrow to get someone off the top because helicopters couldn’t come and grab the wounded.”

Despite the best efforts of the weather, Kay says she had no low points, only highs during her 21 hours on the course.

“There was one point where I was going up a big, long climb and I could see these two young teenage girls running with someone. It’s pitch dark, maybe 10 or 11 at night, and they run down, chatting in French and they say to me, ‘We’re going to run up the hill with you.’

“I was thinking this was actually somewhere I’d like to walk but they were so happy so I was happy to run with them. It was just a really nice atmosphere.

“Then a little bit further on I could see a red and a blue light sabre and I get there and there’s a little kid, he was probably about eight or nine, wearing a little green monster onesie - bright green - with his mum and dad.

“And, again in French, he said, ‘What’s your favourite colour?’ And it’s green for me, so I say, ‘Verte.’ And he just got so excited because he’s in green as well. His mum and dad were just chuffed that somebody actually had some energy to chat to him.

“They were probably the highlights - just random encounters with kids that were happy.”

To Kay’s surprise, she discovered there was a prize-giving ceremony in Chamonix for the top three placegetters in each age bracket, which led to another random encounter, this time with legendary Kiwi trail ultra runner Dan Jones.

“I’m up there with every age group winner so for me [as a fellow Kiwi], being with Dan Jones was pretty special. That guy is a specimen! He’s incredible. I mean, you see videos of him but then in real life he’s like a cyborg!

“Very tall and very muscly and different, because all the European runners are a bit more like Kilian Jornet - little wiry guys. He’s got probably an extra foot and a half on them.”

Given how successful she was at CCC, it’s hardly surprising that Kay’s an advocate for a low heart rate/muscular endurance approach to training. “There are absolutely more pros than cons,” she says.

“The only real con is that it can be isolating if you’re going to be very vigilant about it.”

She’s enjoyed running with mates again since being back from the Alps, but is keen to keep her percentage of work done in zones one and two high, even if that means she has to “sit on the spin bike for two hours a week”.

Sounds like the best of both worlds.

There are way too many events for me to list everything that’s happening around the country, but here is a selection of upcoming races (with a bias towards South East Queensland).

The Running Calendar website is a great source if you want a comprehensive understanding of what’s available around the country.