Spiders, snakes, sneakers, oh my.
Just another day in the life of Vernon ultra athlete Shanda Hill, who continues her quest to become the first person to ever complete three double deca triathlon races.
As of Tuesday morning, Oct. 10, Hill was sitting in second place with only three competitors left at a double deca tri race in Mexico. She has completed 98 kilometres of the final 844 in the running discipline (Hill has finished 76 kms of swimming and 3,600 kms of cycling).
Hill faced some challenging conditions Monday night, as heavy rain made it quite muddy, making her run even more difficult.
鈥淪handa said she preferred running under the moonlight without using a flashlight,鈥� her support crew wrote on her social media page Tuesday. 鈥淪he found the presence of numerous spiders along the path quite unnerving. And, this morning, she experienced a genuinely terrifying moment when she inadvertently stepped on a snake, and it coiled around her calf.鈥�
The Mexico race鈥檚 difficulty level has proven to be so challenging that half the field dropped out by Monday. Hill is the only woman remaining in the double deca race. On Tuesday morning, she was 82 kilometres behind Germany鈥檚 Ronny Reisler. Tsai Ming-Yi (Taiwan) was still on his bike with about 400 kms remaining.
On Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, Hill was pausing every six kilometres to wipe her feet and clean her shoe. The run portion in Mexico is on gravel terrain, and the uneven ground increases the risk of ankle injuries.
The dust from the gravel settles into the athletes鈥� footwear potentially causing painful blisters if not cleaned regularly.
