 I love trail running. I love the sense of adventure and the adrenaline of climbing in the mountains. There's an addiction to the sense of danger you get holding on to a chain rope next to a steep drop or traversing an exposed ridge. None of us knew at the start of TDS 2021 that we were about to see those very real dangers exposed to us in such a tragic way. Of course, the race began like any other. Right, here we are in Cormayette. It's a little bit different from years before and we're starting waves and we're starting in a different location to normal. This is where you drop your bag. So if you've got a halfway bag or like a bag that you collect during the race, that's at Beaufort, that's in this section. Then if you want to have a bag right at the end of the race, if you haven't got any way to get to your hotel or anything, then you can drop a bag here and collect it at the end of the race. And this is the other side of Mont Blanc. It was a warm afternoon. Race start time was 6pm with the faster runners heading off first. I was in the third wave. In the second wave, just ahead, was an experienced runner from the Czech Republic. He was 15 years younger than me, but we both started our ultra-running journeys in 2014. And by coincidence, we both finished the Trans Gran Canaria Ultra in 2020. I imagine he was just as nervous and excited as me as we stood on the start line. 145km of mountains and valleys between us and the finish in Chamonix. Welcome to Filmarum. We're in Cormier for the second time trying to complete TDS. 145km, 9,000m of elevation gain. We're starting in a slightly different place to last time, but it's doing just as hard, if not harder. Let's see what happens. The race start was as energised as always with Owen Flynn's recognisable voice filling the air as we passed under the start gantry. This time, my wife and children were there to see me off, but often they're back at home or in a hotel thinking of me. My wife says she's always in a heightened state of anxiety every time I take to the trails in a big race like this. I imagine the family of the Czech runner ahead of me had similar feelings to those of my wife. Knowing your runner is experienced and confident, but at the same time nervous that everything should go as smoothly as it had done so many times before. He was a much faster runner than me, and had achieved some impressive podium positions in a number of his ultra races. I imagine him striding confidently up the mountain, relishing the beauty of his surroundings. On fresh legs, the first climb out of Cormier was comfortable in the evening sun. Okay, the first aid station climbed, and we are one hour, eight minutes in, with 700 odd meters climbed. In general, the trails around the Mont Blanc Massive are runnable. There are very few sections of technical terrain. What makes the UTMB event so difficult is the amount of elevation, the length and the steepness of the climbs. Two hours and five minutes top of the first climb. So downhill now to the next aid station. So this is Lacombe, no, Lacombe is the next aid station. 2,417 meters we are above sea level with climbed about 1,300 meters, and that's 10 kilometers done. Sun is starting to go in, might get a little cold soon. All right, so this is the second aid station. This is Lacombe. Loads of people are getting themselves ready for the night here now, so it's hats on, gloves on, coats on and the next climb. We're just coming to the end of the second major climb, and we've done 18 kilometers, and now it's a big, it's about 10 kilometers downhill in a minute, all on kind of gravel path. We've just heard thunder. They did warn us at the beginning that there might be a storm tonight or early evening, so we're looking out for that. So we have 16 kilometers to go down to Col de Petit Sambanar, and we need to be there by half past midnight, so it's now half past seven, five hours to get down the hill, 16 kilometers, 10 miles. So we are at Col de Petit Sambanar, which is 35 kilometers, so we have 15 kilometers to run down the hill to Borg San Mauriz. This aid station will close in two hours, so we're well in time. And I've just had soup and I'm going to have some bread and cheese. I've still got some chocolate, and I might get some coke as well. We are here, just come to the bottom of the descent. So we've now got some Borg San Mauriz shortly, and then we've got that massive climb to do up to Fort de La Plata, so we're at about 47 kilometers here. By now, the check runner was some way ahead of me. As I was descending from the Col de Petit Sambanar, he was already at the top of the climb out of Borg San Mauriz, near Fort de La Plata, around 10 kilometers in front of me. So this is Borg San Mauriz at 50 kilometers into the race, nine hours, 14 minutes. Next up is a huge climb, 1500 meter climb all the way up to Fort de La Plata. I was nervous because I knew this next section was going to be tough. I am so happy we've made it to Fort de La Plata at 3 a.m. So we're ahead of cut-off. Beautiful fire up here, and I've got some money, which means I could buy an orangina as well, which last year I couldn't. So I am very, very happy today. But my happiness was to be short-lived. Just a few kilometers further on, I arrived at the most technical section of the race. I am stood at 60 kilometers into the race, and there has been an accident further up on the course, blocking all the rumours. And we've all had a text message to say the race has been abandoned. And we all have to walk. We've got another 16 kilometers to go back down to Borg San Mauriz and get buses back, and that is the end of the race. And there are people, I don't know if you can see the lights up there on the hill. There are people all the way up there who've got to come all the way back down again. Somebody's been speaking to the race directors on the phone. The race is definitely cancelled, but we just have to turn back and go back to Borg San Mauriz, which is going to take us another few hours, and I have to come back and do this again. Of course, my disappointment is understandable, but looking back, it feels incredibly selfish. What I didn't know at the time was that the accident up ahead had been a fatal one. The checkrunner who had started with the same confidence, excitement and nervous anticipation as I had just a few hours earlier had fallen on the most technical and dangerous part of the course. A trail runner, doing what he loved, doing the same thing as me, was dead. This is a very depressing experience climbing down here, but it is a beautiful view and one that we wouldn't have got otherwise. At this point, all we knew was that there had been an accident and the race had been abandoned. I wasn't aware of the countless runners stranded further up, unable to make it back down until ropes had been put in place. I didn't know runners had been turned around because the rescue helicopter couldn't see to retrieve the body because of the blinding head torches below. So finally arrived back at Borg Samuritz. That was a long, long journey down the hill. I'm not having a lot of luck with this race, am I? One DNF and one abandoned, but there we are. There's not a lot I can do about it. The race is over and I'm now waiting for a bus to take me back to Chamonix. Eventually news started to filter back about the death of the Czech runner and the mood turned to one of somber reflection. Much of that reflection is still selfish of course. It could have been me. I'm so relieved it wasn't me. I hope my wife knows I'm okay, but it must have been absolutely heartbreaking for the family of the Czech runner. Don't stop running my friend. Don't spend your life frozen in fear of what might go wrong because life is all about taking risks. It's the risk-takers who turn their own lives around or change the world. So I will see you on the start line of our next race.