Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc: A Toronto runner’s crazy race finish

Brian Culbert’s experience at the Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc on Labour Day weekend is a perfect illustration of why this race is known as one of the world’s toughest ultras.

The 53-year-old Toronto investment advisor finished the punishing 168K race, but not before suffering hallucinations and passing out with 6K to go.

After running well for more than 40 hours up and down most of the race’s 9,000 metres of elevation changes, Culbert began seeing imaginary rocks that magically moved away when he tried to touch them. Then the runner in front of him morphed into a dwarf.

“The next thing I remember is the sun burning on my face, an Australian female racer shaking me and mountain goats surrounding me,” Culbert told the Toronto Star. He had passed out at the side of the trail for about two and half hours.

When Culbert told the Australian runner who woke him that he was dreaming, she explained to him that it was important to finish the race in his dream. “That was brilliant,” Culbert says. “She appealed to my competitive nature.” He got up and kept running.

The crowd cheered him when he crossed the finish line in 43:19:01, but Culbert says he was still in a dream state. “Just finishing this race is a victory,” he says.

About 40 per cent of the field dropped out, including elite Canadian ultrarunner Gary Robbins.

In his charity drive for this race, Culbert has raised $20,000 Michael “Pinball” Clemons Foundation, which will pass on the donation to the Free the Children charity to build schools in developing countries.

An experienced adventure runner and cyclist, Culbert has raised about $600,000 for various children’s charities since 2004, when he began fundraising after the Sick Kids Hospital helped save his son from a life-threatening skin disorder.