Sophie Woods: the fastest ever across the Alps

Woods, 42, set off from Trieste on 4 July and reached Monaco in early August, roughly six days quicker than the previous best. The route climbs more than 109,000 metres, the equivalent of scaling Mount Everest from sea level twelve times. She ran much of the final stretch on as little as 90 minutes’ sleep a night, through a European heatwave. There was a point, hot and sore and swollen, shuffling rather than running, when she was not sure she could go on. She carried on anyway.

A record like this is never a solo effort, and Sophie is the first to say so. Behind her was a crew led by her husband George, Zoe Salt documenting every climb, and a team fielding the media and the logistics, as she put it, “a formidable group of women in my corner.” These long mountain runs, she has said, come down to problem-solving and the right people around you as much as raw speed.

All the way, she shared the climbs and the exhaustion on Instagram, and Kiwis followed along, at home and scattered around the world, willing her on. When someone in our community achieves something this big, it lands with all of us, at home and abroad. Broadcasters from CNN to the BBC ran her story, and it was a real thrill to hear a Kiwi accent on the world’s news channels.

Woods has also used the moment to make a point. Women’s endurance, she argues, is barely researched, reported or funded next to men’s, and she wonders what more women might achieve if it were. Women, she told DW, are “fighting for crumbs in the sporting world.”

Congratulations, Sophie. From all of us, at home and around the world: what a run.

Read more and follow Sophie: instagram.com/sophieamygrant