It’s a testament to the ultra-marathoner that Helen Francis has become that the goal is no longer simply to finish her races – races that typically range from 50km to 100km and onwards to 100 miles.
Most now constitute a good run for the 50 year-old long-time Sudbury native originally born and raised in Wolverhampton, smack dab in the middle of the industrial heartland of Great Britain.
Over time, the Exploration and Mining Geology major who moved to northern Ontario accepting a job at Inco at the age of 21 has garnered the ability to avoid the “death march”, as she terms it, that point where you are no longer even technically running.
Fresh off another appearance at the Sinister 7 Ultra in Alberta in July (Francis would finish 7th in a field of more than 75 women of all ages who tackled the 50-mile distance) and having claimed another title as the top female at the Sulphur Springs Trail Race in Ancaster in May, the mother of five via a combined family is now preparing for the Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc on August 29th.
For as much as an ultra might be considered exceptional to the other 99.9% of the human population, Francis knows that this particular race, the 100km CCC (Courmayeur-Champex-Chamonix) that travels through Italy, Switzerland and France is not like the others.
“This one is definitely a finish goal,” she said recently. “I really hope that I run well, but this will be more climbing than I have ever done in any race” – covering an elevation gain of some 6150 metres, to be precise. “I will have to power-hike some of these climbs. For me the test is when I am coming down or on a false flat, can I run?”
“That will be the big question for me.”
Running is something that Helen Francis has, generally speaking, always been able to do.
“I was always into running track and field at the city level,” she noted, recalling her youth some 30 minutes or so down the road from Birmingham. “At my school, I think I was good at cross-country because I didn’t stop to have a cigarette behind the bike shed like most of my friends were doing.”
Fast forward a few years, with Francis completing her university studies in Cardiff (Wales) and looking to explore the world in a way her career aspirations permitted – “I really thought I was going to be a backpack geologist – I really liked that world” – and it was clear her love of running was not likely to leave her side.
“It was at this point that I realized that running was really good at keeping me healthy and was also relatively transportable – you could do it pretty much anywhere,” she said. Even as the backpack geologist gave way to a woman who appreciated all that a small community had to offer, her athletic endeavours remained central to her story.
“I was more of a fitness runner in Sudbury, joining local events,” she recalled. “It was a way of keeping me out of trouble and helping me make life choices that might otherwise be the other way. Running is meditative. I started to think about marathon running, which seems like a natural place for most runners to go.”
Starting with Chicago, tackling the bucket list item that is Boston and squeezing a few other Ontario marathons in between, Francis would discover a fit that wasn’t quite right. “Cities are fun to explore (while running a marathon), but they don’t have the same appeal to me as the wilderness.”
From a seed planted via a brief television series on to her first crack at the treks that typically run nearly double a standard marathon, Francis broke the ice, in the world of ultra marathons, with her 2016 50-mile race in Haliburton. “It was such a wonderful organization,” she said, never looking back.
“Not only did they have an incredible volunteer organization that made you feel like a super hero at every single aid station, but the runners became a community pretty quickly. There was this sense of: how do we help you get through this, regardless of how low you might feel, how nutrition deprived you might be, to get you to that finish.”
Winning the women’s event did not hurt either, when it came to feeding her passion.
Sure, there is the whole physical challenge that comes with keeping your body in motion, more or less constantly, for events that might present a cut-off finishing time of some thirty hours or so. But these races are so much more than that to Francis and her kind.
“It’s about problem solving,” she explained. “Whatever this race will throw at me, I will figure this out. Some of that certainly comes with experience. I now know that if I take a break, eat something, walk for a little bit, you will be surprised at how quickly things will change.”
These are challenges you do not tackle alone.
“I am fortunate that my husband (Heiko Leers) goes along with these,” she said. “I like picking different destinations so that we can do some travel with it too.”
Yet for as much as the scenery that stands ahead at UTMB 2024 ranks among the most breath-taking that Francis will ever experience, this next race is not about travel.
It’s about finishing – plain and simple – even for the wonder that is Helen Francis.
