The 10th ‘physical’ edition of Hong Kong’s classic Lantau 70 had everything you would expect from an exciting competitive trail race. Several victory candidates, both local and foreign, a great and varied course and challenging mixed weather conditions. The races even had to be interrupted for 45 minutes around noon due to a serious thunderstorm with lightning strikes - not what you want when running on open hill ridges. Safety first and kudos to the organisational team of the Trail Hub for managing the situation in an efficient, clear and non-confusing way. There was clearly a plan for such potential situations. As such, races were able to continue without much ado after the storm had passed. For everyone affected, net running times were recorded by chip.

In fact, the first six runners probably never realised that behind them people were instructed to stop running. Jeff Campbell, Alessandro Sherpa, Arnie Macaneras, James Balagot, Hua Zhaohong and “Marc” Marc all passed CP 2 already when the race director made the decision and the storm unleashed its force on the area.

Up until CP2, which was km 28, the battle for the race victory had already been reduced to two of the three top favourites: Jeff Campbell and Alessandro Sherpa. ATM Champion Arnie Macaneras made his debut in Hong Kong and struggled with the traditional “stairs”. The sympathetic Filipino looked strong and was running with them for over 20 km but then had to let go. On the way to CP3 - in the pouring rain - Sherpa also had to admit Jeff Campbell is the ‘stair master’ and the gap opened up in the most technical section of the race, mainly downhill. Running the Hong Kong stairs is indeed a very specific skill.

Campbell opened up a gap of 10-12 minutes, and it says a lot that once passed CP3, Sherpa maintained the same pace as Campbell for nearly the entire rest of the race. Only when he made an unfortunate and quite nasty tumble towards the finish did Sherpa lose more time. Jeff Campbell underlined his great victory with a finish time of 7h34 - the second fastest ever despite the weather conditions! Only China’s global elite Yan Longfei went quicker in 2018 (7h03). It was the Canadian’s 6th ATM race victory as well, which puts him on the same level as Sefli Ahar, Milton Amat, Hisashi Kitamura and John Ellis in the ATM Race Win table.

A bloodied Sherpa came in in 7h57, which is the fifth fastest time ever. The 2018 ATM Champion is also already qualified for the ATM Final this year. Even a smiling Arnie Macaneras’ third-place time of 8h40 is still the 13th fastest of all time - despite him calling the Hong Kong stairs as ‘crazy’ after the finish. Let’s add the surprising American newcomer-on-the-scene James Balagot in fourth place, just seven minutes behind the ATM Champion in 8h48. According to the LT 70 record books, Balagot is now faster on this course than John Ellis and Ryan Whelan, for example.

Fifth place went to Hong Kong’s Kwong Ho Lee ahead of the Belgian ‘Marc’ Marc. Kwong Ho Lee was the first of the runners who got stopped at CP2. Later, he ran the remaining part of the race in a faster time than Marc and -with adjusted race time- ended up fifth in the race result.

The women’s race was tight, and yet one runner seemed always in control: Katrina Hamlin. Living in Lantau and very near to the race venue in Mui Wo, Hamlin felt the pressure from a string of female runners early on, but always came first at the checkpoints. The more the day progressed, the further she would then pull away from the others. A strong win for Hamlin in 9h36 - third fastest female time ever. The battle for second in the end was decided between Aggy Sabanal-Marte and Flora Wing Yee Ching. Both exchanged places a few times, and when it looked Sabanal would get the upper hand, Wing Yee Ching came back and snatched second place by three minutes only. Philippines’ Sabanal - the 2018 vice-ATM champion - struggled with digestive issues, but was delighted with her podium in Lantau 70. Before giving birth, Sabanal was known as a pure mountain climber. Since her comeback to the trails last year, she has also shown ever increasing running pace. Her podium this weekend is testimony to that.

Katia Kucher was fourth ahead of Jinko Takeshige, who both overtook Indonesia’s Ruth Theresia in the latter stages. Theresia’s first ATM race in three years did not go entirely as planned. Early on she was still in the mix for the podium, but then her hip began to hurt. After the finish, the former ATM champion said it’s been an issue since last week and therefore she did not want to push for the remainder of the race.

Lantau 70: Jeff Campbell wins superb battle!