Je suis prêt à courir

Well, I am definitely rusty on my French but I'm hoping to not be rusty for the World Championships.  Less than a week away before we compete at the Worlds in Breve, France.

The popularity of the race continues to build each year.  The list of runners was recently published and we have 81 women from 22 countries competing this year (compared to 65 women from 18 countries last year).  On the men's side of the race, 153 men from 30 countries will compete. 

For the team competition, we also have additional teams signed up.  We had 11 in 2008, 14 in 2009 and this year 17 teams (a team must have at least 3 runners).  The countries bringing women's teams this year are: Australia, Austria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Russia, Spain, Sweden and United States.

Looking over the list, some big miles have been posted by the French team.  They have won the gold medal at the Worlds for the last two years.  Can they make it three in a row?  Team USA is hoping to prevent that!  Other strong contenders (at least on paper) are Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan and Russia.  The US women were able to pull out the Silver medal last year with Italy taking the bronze.  Should be an exciting race.

It is interesting to note that Russia's team of three women are all older than me with one being over 60!  Now that's inspiring!!

The race should be covered a few places on the Internet:  the race website:   http://www.24h-brive.fr/ and the International Association of Ultrarunners website: http://www.iau.org.tw/news_detail.php?Id=561
There is even going to be live updates on Twitter:  http://twitter.com/iaunews

Once the race is over, I'll be posting all the details and hopefully bring home a medal!!