Winter Running Gear – Sergio Fernández

Today we take a look at the gear one should have in mind when facing a winter multistage ultramarathon. Top Spaniard ultrarunner Sergio Fernández participated a few weeks ago in the Rock and Ice Ultra, a race across the Arctic tundra in Canada. His 5th place only two weeks after finishing twelve in the Libyan Challenge made me want to know more about the gear he used and the conditions he raced under. The below interview is the result of our (written) conversation. 

TRSoul (Ed Martinell) – Let’s begin with the sled. You pulled it through all the race. How was it?
Sergio Fernández – The sled was very simple, just a plastic platform, stiff rods – instead of ropes, so it does not run over you when going downhill – and a harness. I didn’t think I’d race again on ice and snow so I didn’t buy it. I borrowed from Scott Smith, the race director. But it was too big and too flat and it rubbed too much.  Truth be told, I didn’t train with the sled before the race, and that didn’t help at all.  

Given that the race takes place under freeezing conditions (-30F),  wearing the right clothing is more of an obligation than a just a simple help to be a top finisher. What kind of clothing did you wear? Was it part of the equipment provided by your sponsors?
Without a doubt, “half” of the race is having the right stuff. It won’t make you a winner but it can make you a quitter. I read, followed the advise of Scott Smith and Raidlight and I think I got it right. The key is to not be cold but also to not sweat and that’s not an easy task when days are long, you have changing weather conditions  and physical effort.
On my legs, I wore only two different tights: Raidlight R-Dry as inner layer and Raidlight Trail Raider as outer layer. On the upper body, the three classic layers: Raidlight Desert Shirt,  Odlo thermal shirt (level 3) and a Raidlight Trail Rider Micropolar as second layer and Raidlight Weather Softshell on top of all.
On my head, fundamental part as that’s were your lose most of the heat, I wore two Buff, one on my face (Polar Buff) and one on the head (Windstopper, Thyphoon Buff). It’s much more versatile than a tipycal balaclava.

I know you love Injinji socks. Did you use them this time?
Right, after many ultramarathons and many blisters, I always use Injiji. But this time I wore Liner socks in two different materials: Coolmax and bamboo. I didn’t appreciate any difference between the two. Highly recommended carrying a couple of them as you may have no time to dry them out for the next day. On top of those, I wore Thermolite Lurbel . I never ran with two pairs of socks before, but the combination worked fine.

Lets talk about footwear. What brand did you choose for the occasion? 
Again, I relied on the advise I was given. I wore regular shoes – actually the Mizuno Ascend 3 I ran in when in Libya a couple of weeks before – and then added a pair of FlightBoot Kathoola. These are made of neoprene and give you a great insulation but they are also heavy and sweaty. If they could make it lighter, this would be an amazing product.     
The Kathoola use their own specific showshoe which gave me some headaches. The fixation is very compicated to use with gloves and that’s definetely something to be improved. I also missed some cross cleats so it would get better traction on ice.

In terms of nutrition, what did you ingest? Did you carry engergy products like gels or the like?
When running, I hardly ate, just a few nuts to not starve. I wasn;t hungry or thirsty. When on each camp, I had freeze-dry food and ate a lot. Really, I spent the evenings just eating.
As per the energy gels and bars, I had problems with some of them. Some froze and there was no way I could take them. The other option was to carry them inside your clothing, but this is not optimal as you have to take off the gloves and put them back each time. And when in freezing temperatures, that’s really not funny. Also, not all gels froze. It’s just amatter of testing them in advance (something that I did not).

Did you carry any electronics? I guess the GPS was mandatory, but did you carry something else?
Yes, GPS is mandatory. I actually used two of them. A Garmin eTrex Vista with the waypoints and route and a Garmin Forerunner 405 to check my time and heart rate from time to time. It’s advisable to check how the batteries perform before jumping into a race like this one. For example, the 405 is not supposed to work under freezing temps, but under the gloves it worked without problems.
Also, this time I decided to leave the mp3 player at home. I wanted to be aware at how my body was reacting to a new environment for me.

Tell us a few tricks you learned from running a winter ultramarathon.
There are many things you learn if you pay attention to the experienced guys. The main thing I learned is to continously monitor your current conditions and those of your environment so you can anticipate the future and act in consequence. That’s why I decided to keep the snowshoes out of the sled, to carry duck tape or rehearse everything with the gloves on.  And when racing  in this type of events, don’t run when you get close to the finish line. You don’t want to break sweat.

And to wrap up,  something you wouldn’t bring again and something you missed?
I wouldn’t bring that sled again, too flat and long. Something compact and a bit more elevated would work better. Also some gels, which I could barely eat. And I would definitely test more and better everything I took with me.
I would bring feather shoes to relax when in campsites and maybe something to insulate my body better when sleeping and spare me some hip ache. 

Thanks Sergio!

Written by Eduard Martinell · Eduard maintains the blog trailrunningSoul.com and these are the latest posts:
- Video – I Trail Run Series – 4. Why Trail Run
- Video – I Trail Run Series – 3. Advantages
- Video – I Trail Run Series – 2. Background
Eduard's short bio

Relatively new to trail running, I've always loved sports and outdoors. Blending both of them into trail running just was the logical next step to take.