Bromont Ultramarathon 2024

Race Information

• Name: Bromont Ultramarathon
• Date: October 19, 2024
• Distance: 80 kilometers
• Location: Bromont, Quebec
• Website: https://bromontultra.com/
• Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/12697253528
  • NOTE: map is hidden, explained below
• Time: 11:52:49
• Official Result

Goals

Splits

Preamble

This was my first ultramarathon. I started 2024 training for the Ottawa Marathon, but followed a ultra training plan with the vague idea that maybe I would try a 50km at some point later in the year. I received confirmation of joining the 80km for Bromont in July with just 3 months to the race.

Prior to 2024 I'd run one marathon (Toronto 2018), and two half marathons (2018 and 2023). I have been running since 2018 though some years only occasionally. I wouldn't have called myself a serious runner, more running for general fitness. My biggest feat prior to this was that I spent 4 months cycling 10,500 kilometers across Canada in 2023. After that my base cardio was pretty good and I started running again setting a PR in the half marathon just three weeks after finishing the bike trip.

Training

I had started training in January and chose the Hal Higdon 50km Ultramarathon training plan. It was a bit of a false start as I decided to take the month of February cycling in Florida (1820km). I continued running in March but jumped ahead a bit in the training plan so that I could reach the marathon distance by the time of the Ottawa Marathon at the end of May. I bonked - hard - in the Ottawa Marathon. I had pushed myself to try to experience a real bonk. I do not recommend it, but knowing what it feels like to run out of energy and how to fix it is an important lesson to learn (I still managed a PR by a few minutes). I spent a few weeks recuperating from the marathon (I had four toe nails that were falling off and both heels were raw).

I continued the Hal Higdon plan until it finished in early September. It was all road running. My goal was just to train myself for long distance. Because the Bromont Ultra is mostly on trails and had lots of vertical I signed up for a trail run at the start of September - The Jay Peak Trail Running Festival - and ran the 17.7km there. The main reason was that I (and my crew chief/sister Becky) wanted to see how trail races "work". What do people eat? What gear do people bring? What gear do they leave behind? What shape are they in? What do they eat? Does everyone run all the time? Even up hill? We had so many questions and we talked to lots of people while there who were really helpful. I even met someone who was doing the Bromont 80km who had run it before and he had great advice. It was here that we learned that the trail running community is awesome.

Shortly after the Jay race I ran my first 50km training run. I did two 25km laps, all roads, on a hot day all with a fair amount of elevation. It taught me a few things. First, pacing is VERY important. Second, listen to your body. Third, you need to eat and drink before you feel like it. After this I started focusing my running mostly on trails. My short runs would be on roads, but my long runs would be on trails and with a lot of vertical. I spent a lot of time running up and down local ski hills with Orford here in Magog, Quebec being a favourite. I went back to Jay Peak one weekend and did two laps on the 17.7km course. Some weekends I sacrificed distance for elevation. If I would usually do a 30km run on a Sunday, I was okay with instead doing 21km with LOTS of elevation. Elevation makes running weird. It becomes difficult to figure out average pace and estimate run times. It will also kick your butt if you're not trained for it.

In the final 1.5 months before the race I tried to keep my weekly average distance at about 80-90km with as much elevation as I thought I could take. I also focused on nutrition and hydration, training myself to take in about 60-90 grams of carbs an hour and learning how much I could and should drink each hour. NUTRITION IS VERY IMPORTANT. Any run that was more than 10km was a run I was training for eating and drinking. In fact, that was the main purpose of my long runs after the 50km training run!

Four weeks before the race I got COVID-19. It knocked me out for an entire week and I did no running. The moment I started feeling better I did a 10km run, and then got a serious sinus infection that lasted another week. That was two weeks of no running with only two weeks till the race. My research had shown that those weeks were usually taper weeks, and so I reduced the taper to 10-ish days and pushed some big distance and elevation when I got better.

The last big run I did was the 1.5 weeks before the race. I did 53km on Mount Orford on a trail (5 times up, 5 times down). It was a total of 3730 meters/12238 feet of elevation (Bromont 80km is ~3300meters). It took 12.5 hours. My crew chief/sister stayed at a parking lot at the bottom of the mountain where we simulated an aid station to get an idea of how much time that would take. This might seem like a bad idea, but it was ideal. I figured out my nutrition strategy wasn't working, discovered my body was ok with that much elevation in one run, got lots of practice with my gear, and still felt like I could keep running. All of this gave me a LOT of confidence going into the ultra.

Team

I was crewed by my sister (Becky) and a close friend (Alex). There are a lot of reasons I asked them to do this (both actually volunteered before I could ask them) but the most important reason was that they know me very well - especially what I'm like under stress - and I trust them (Alex and I had done a fair amount of multi day hiking together)

My sister is a nurse and so I tasked her with focusing on foot health/treatment. We did some research and found that the book for foot health is Fixing Your Feet: Injury Prevention and Treatments for Athletes by John Vonhof. She built a foot care kit and we both tracked my training runs for places I was getting blisters and tried different fixes during training. By ultra day, we knew where the problem spots were and how to fix them!

My friend Alex focused on nutrition. She and I discussed possible food options, plans, and during my training I would try these things out. We built a nutrition plan for the race and she charted food plans based on estimated paces we thought I would run. We packed enough food for the slowest pace (and a bit more). My secret weapon was Coca-Cola. Lots of sugar, water, and a touch of caffeine. When I feel like I'm dragging I down a bunch of this at the aid stations.

Plan

The first goal of the race was to finish. In the Ottawa Marathon just 5 months earlier I had tried a wildly aggressive pace I'd never run in training and bonked after 26km. I did.not. want to do that again. I focused on a sustainable pace.

My second goal was to finish in under 12 hours. Based on all of my training runs, we thought this one might be possible, but since my maximum distance in training was 50km we were not sure. I had no idea how I would feel after 50km. I chose 12 hours for two reasons. Reason one is that it seemed like a slightly aggressive but doable time for me. Reason two is that a sub-12 finish time would qualify me for the Vermont 100 in 2025 and I wanted to keep my options open in case I enjoyed my first ultramarathon.

We used Discord to organize ourselves. Channels for food, gear, feet, maps, documents, ultra research, checklists, and aid stations. It was great to keep all the pictures, documents, checklists, and research in one place and keep it organized.

We did a few voice calls before the race and discussed anything we thought we should talk about. My crew had a list of questions that I think were important. They allowed us all to talk through things we'd been thinking about but were not clear on and sort out some of our anxieties. Questions like...

• What should we do if you fall behind on pace?
• What should we do if you fall behind on hydration?
• What should we do if you fall behind on carbs/calories?
• Is there anytime we should intervene (ie broken bones, incoherent, ect)?
• Can we decide that you shouldn't keep going?
• How much would you like to eat at aid stations?
• What food do you find easiest to eat when sick?
• How often do you plan to change socks?
• How often do you plan to change clothing?
• What would you like post race (blankets, different clothing, food, drinks, meds, ect)?
• Communication plan in between aid stations (any?)?

Answering these was good to get us all on the same page.

Pre-race

I live about 45km from Bromont and chose to sleep in my own bed the night before, but they offer camping at the hill. We had checklists of everything I needed for nutrition and gear. We packed it the day before. I also went on a leisurely ~20km bike ride the day before which felt nice! We drove to Bromont at about 5pm the day before for gear check and bib pickup. Because my crew was following me around the course, I opted out of having a drop bag (which was at the P7 station and available to you at both passes through that station).

Morning of the race I ate a large serving of oatmeal with cream, peanuts, and chocolate chips (my usual breakfast). We drove to the hill and arrived about 45 minutes before start. We listened to the pre-race briefing. I ate a gel about 15 minutes before starting the race.

The weather was incredible. Low of 3C and high of 18C with clear skies. The two previous years had been near freezing with hard driving rain. I had been prepared for something like that, so was in fine spirits with this incredible forecast!

The starting gun was 7am, just as the sun was rising.

Race

Start -> Iron Hill (17.4km)

There were some big changes to the race this year. The start point was changed, the aid stations were changed up a bit, but one of the biggest changes was that the 80km and 160km runners all left together. Somewhere between 300-400 people all left at the same time and we started on some narrow trails, so it was cramped and somewhat slow going. I had started near the back of the pack and spent a lot of time trying to get past people.

After a few kilometers we hit a road and it opened up. Almost all the road running was hard packed dirt roads, and they were quiet. Any traffic was usually race supporters, family, and locals.

The first serious climb started at around 5km. We entered a rough trail through a maple syrup operation in the woods. The sun was rising and filtering through the yellow and red leaves of the trees, everything was bathed in amber light. There were only a few small steep climbs in this section that required walking/power hiking. There was one lookout with a really spectacular view, and it was one of the few pictures I stopped to take.

After this section we were on the road for about 4km-5km until we hit the first aid station in Iron Hill.

We did a fairly quick stop here. My crew and I went through our checklist, refilled water and food, and I sat for a few minutes. I stayed maybe 8 minutes in total. The nutrition plan called for me to eat an entire PB&J at this stop, and my crew pressured me to eat it so I did. This was a mistake, as for the next hour my stomach was unhappy. Hereafter I ate only as much as I felt comfortable to do.

Iron Hill -> P7 (18.8km)

The majority (maybe 80%) of this section was road running. We ran dirt roads that rolled through farmland, and while that was nice...I missed the trails. The sun was out and it was warming up with very little tree cover on the roads. Twice we cut onto trails into the trees for a couple kilometers with some elevation, but otherwise there was no serious climbing in this section. I stopped once to put blister tape on the inner arch of my left foot as I felt a hot spot and it was too early for blisters!

The P7 aid station is a parking lot at a ski lift for Bromont. It served as the 2nd and 3rd aid station for the run which was new this year. This meant it was BUSY. AT some point they ran out of water. Because this double stop station was new to the race there were some problems, but credit to the race organizers who were reacting quickly to try to fix them! I stopped for about 12 minutes. We found I was well ahead of my expected pace, so I focused on slowing myself. I did not want to overshoot and collapse. I wanted to finish! And finish with gas still in the tank!

Here's video of the P7 aid station area

P7-> P7 (10.6km)

This section had a bunch of elevation, was all on trails, and largely in the trees. It involved a lot of switchbacks when climbing and descending. We were largely running up and around Bromont and the hills immediately beside it (Bromont is one of a complex of a few peaks smooshed together). It was all up and down, but I don't remember any of the slopes being very steep. I remember running almost this entire section. It was some of the best trail running I've ever done! (Note: I have done very little trail running).

It got a little confusing in this section as the trails were fairly close together and you could see people running all over the place. It was easy to think you were going the wrong way at times. This is mostly because the other races had joined us (the 10k, 30k, and 55k) so it was busier. The mountain bike racers were also on the course in this section and there was traffic at times. Add to that...people out for weekend hikes and walks also on these trails.

Overall the course is well marked however. It is well flagged and turns are well marked.

I arrived back at P7 to the surprise of my crew who were not expecting me that quickly. I took my longest break of the race here, about 20-25 minutes. I changed my shirt, we took off all my blister tape and reapplied it, and I ate some solid food (an onigiri I had brought and some miso soup from the aid station). This was when we discovered that the aid station had run out of water. Thankfully my crew had about 600ml of their own water that they gave me and I set off.

P7-> Pavillon d'Accueil (16.2km)

This section sent us back onto trails on the hills around Bromont to start. There was a lot of climbing for the first 5-ish kilometers, but then majority downhill for about 9km. I spaced out while running, tripped on a rock or root, fell, and cut one my fingers on a rock. It was bleeding pretty good so I stopped and bandaged it up and kept going.

I was quickly running out of water however. I came across a 160km runner who hadn't got any water at P7 and looked to be fading. I gave him what water I had left. The race chart said it was 7km from P7 to the water station, but it was more like 10km. Everyone was grumbling as we all kept pushing. We eventually reached the water station and it was packed with people filling up, and drinking as much as they could. This was the only issue with the race that I had.

We spent the next section was back to road running for a long time. There was a lot of long gradual climbing. We went back onto trails for a ~5km and arrived at the final aid station. I did a quick stop as I was feeling good and didn't want to slow down too much. Checking our pace estimations, I was roughly on track for 12 hours. I wanted to get out and push a strong finish to try to hit my sub-12 goal! I drank a lot of coca-cola at this stop, and popped a vitamin-I at the urging of my sister.

Pavillon d'Accueil -> Finish (17km)

This section was the most difficult of the race. A lot of elevation, and a lot of it was quite steep! First was a mix of trails and roads, and the roads had some long and gradual climbs. We emerged at the base of chair lift and started straight up a ski run (named "Edmonton" on the Bromont map). We curved back into the woods and did the trails/roads mix again, mostly uphill. We emerged back at the ski run and ran wooded trails across the mountains and across ski runs. We came to the main base of Bromont (where the water park is) and again climbed and descended ski runs. Eventually we reached the hardest section of the run. Somewhere between 74km and 76km we did a wildly steep section. If you've seen photos of the steep section of this ultramarathon you'd probably seen pictures of a steep pitch with ropes tied between the trees to help you climb. This is where those photos are taken. Previously the run started at the main ski base and this was early on in the run, but now it's only 5km from the end. It was rough. I passed a lot of struggling people. All my elevation training was paying off because I was sore but still in good shape.

Eventually we emerged at the peak of Bromont proper. The sun was just set and the horizon was a deep crimson rimmed with hues of orange and burnt umber. Knowing that time was ticking, I didn't dare stop to take a photo. It was very windy and cooling off. I took the opportunity to finally take out my headlamp and jacket. There was a water station there but I knew it was all downhill from here. I saw a clock at the top that read 6:34pm. I had fewer than 30 minutes to finish with 4km to go. I took off.

The "all downhill" actually had a few small uphill portions...with more switchbacks. The trail was only wide enough for one person on the switchbacks and I spent a lot of time asking to pass people. Eventually we hit the final downhill section and I could hear the cheering of the finish line in the distance. It was all gravel roads on ski runs and I bombed down them as fast and I thought was safe. Maybe even a little faster. It was pitch black now and I reached a final fork in the road: turn left to start your second 80km lap, turn right to finish line. I turned right and finished strong!

Post-race

I still felt good enough to keep going. I figure I might have had another 20km in me. Not 80km though, and certainly not in the dark. I met up with my crew and family at the finish line, took some photos, and we went to eat and have a beer (provided for finishers!). I also did a bit of stretching.

I slept ok that night. The next day I was not nearly as sore as I expected to be. I went for a 8km walk with a friend and did a 2 hour bouldering session.

I gave myself a week off of running though. I don't think I needed it, but I wanted to be fully recovered before I hit the pavement again.

Gear

I was tricked out. I bought everything. I was a buy-hard.

Shoes: Salomon Thundercross

• the thinking here was that it could be pouring rain and mud, I wanted trail shoes

Vest: Salomon Adv 12

• It's the only one I've ever owned. It's great. I opted to carry three flasks (two in the shoulders and one in the back). It held all my water, food, and extras.

Poles: Leki Ultratrail FX One

• I bought new poles for this race. I would have used my old poles, but they were 6 years old and cracked. I didn't want gear failure during the race!

Jacket: Salomon Bonatti Trail

• There are so many cheaper options, but I liked the fit and its built to fit my running vest. I've used it a lot and enjoy it.

I had Patagonia running shorts. I had two pairs of socks and two t-shirts (both switched on the second pass through P7). I wore a buff as a headband and switched it at each aid station. I carried a headlamp, gloves and toque (required in case of cold weather), aluminum emergency blanket (required), small first aid kit (required), and a whistle that was part of my running vest. I added some extra reflective tape on my jacket (just...always good to have...also required on your clothes). I always carry some toilet paper and a small towel (the deuce of spades!) because if that's ever happened to you on a run, you know :P

Bromont Ultra Advice

The Bromont Ultramarathon bills itself as the toughest Canadian ultra East of the Rockies. This is the only ultra I've ever done, but others have told me that reputation is not hyperbole. There are only 4 or 5 short sections that are "technical" and tough, but it is a lot of up and down. Even the long road sections tend to be rolling landscape. I had done a lot of training on incline and steep trails in the 2 months before the run and it really paid off.

Be prepared for all weather. Quebec in the fall can be cold and very wet. The two previous years were both like that, with the race ending early one year because conditions were so bad. They had people calling for rescue after 6km last year because they were hypothermic. Prepare for all weather conditions!

Finally: I thought this was an incredibly fun run. It really helps that we had ideal weather but it was challenging, well organized, and a great community of people. I'm really proud that my first ultra was here in my native Eastern Townships!

Useful Documents/Charts

I had trouble finding much information about the Bromont Ultra when I was training. The organizers don't release maps until a week or two before the race. This is because large sections of the race go through private land and they do not want people running there without permission. I respect this and you should also! The Bromont Ultra is a fundraiser that is made possible by people allowing the race to use their land. Don't ruin it for everyone!

I won't share a map, but I will share some of the other documents that you might find useful. Remember the race can change from year to year, this is not guaranteed to be true for next year!

If you're ever looking for advice or help with the Bromont Ultra you can contact me and I'll be happy to answer any questions I can!

Made with a new race report generator created by Scott Davis.