NEVER-ENDING STOREYS

Back at the Niesenbahn, those Odor-eaters won’t win themselves. My number – siebenundsiebzig (77) – is called and I and my randomly assigned race buddy (Camelbak, neat Germanic glasses, hair as white as his knee-high socks) are ushered through the door of the base station and towards an electronic counter. This works down from 20 seconds, during which we share a handshake, and then the starter’s arm goes down and we’re trundling over the river on the elevated steel walkway.

‘ Don’t go off too hard.’ The mantra repeats in my mind as I slip into a cautious early pace, aided by the walkway ramping up alarmingly, like a reverse ski jump. White socks is even slower. ‘Treppe,’ I announce proudly and he steps aside with a cheery nod. Early days. We’re all friends.

I feel good. My legs are strong and my breathing is regular, and the morning sun has just crept over the mountain, flooding the valley with sunlight and taking the edge off the crisp air. I allow myself the occasional glance left and right to admire the valley opening up below. Cattle bells tinkle in the distance. I’m enjoying this.

And then, all too soon, everything starts to fall apart. There’s just no let-up. In a conventional run, as Gallagher points out, you can vary the intensity, commit,

then coast, then commit a bit more. This is relentless. A dull ache takes hold of my quads and calves, which, over the next hour or so, will morph into a jagged, burning sensation, and a stream of sweat falls from the peak of my cap.

The variable surface is another challenge I’ve not anticipated. Single flight this may be, but it’s divided into multiple short segments: neat trellised steel steps; narrow, bricked ones; improvised stone steps so high you need both hands, and a little momentum, to even scale. Some sections have handrails, others have nothing. One unstable stretch has an accompanying rope, which I flail at.

I dig in and clamber on, ignoring my first ‘treppe’ request from behind for a good 10 seconds before relenting. The gradient is shocking in places; a stone I dislodge slips into the track-side channel and bounces off down the mountainside to land in the river possibly as much as a minute later. Running down this staircase would be not just impossible, but quite possibly lethal.

The first and only refreshment station comes just over halfway, at around 6,000 steps in, at the Schwandegg or middle station. I enter a cool, dimly lit tunnel and then, abruptly, the staircase stops and a walkway takes me 20 metres across to a parallel track. This is the point where passengers on the Niesenbahn must change from one distinctive red carriage to another. This enables the railway to operate on two wires rather than a single, impractically heavy one.

I gulp down multiple plastic cups of water and orange squash, suddenly chilly in my saturated top and shorts, and dine liberally at the refuelling buffet. It’s fairly standard stuff, save for the enormous hunks of chocolate that I almost instantly regret gorging on. ‘Ah, you’re English!’ one of the volunteers says, when I offer my thanks. ‘Keep going. You’re almost there.’

Well, not really. Not at all, in fact. Another 5,000 steps ( give or take), is going to sting a bit, I’m fairly certain of it. Exiting the tunnel, I get on the heels of a woman who has a neat, efficient technique and slipstream her for a welcome 10 minutes or so. If my pained wheezing bothers her, she has the grace not to let it show. I steal a look back: behind, stretching away to little more than dots far below, figures are bowed against the gradient, emerging from tunnels and scrambling up the track like rodents. It’s a surreal sight: part race, part train-crash evacuation.

It’s around three- quarters of the way through that I spot Bruno. A tall, effervescent fellow and a training partner of the late Ueli Steck (a legendary mountaineer and speed climber), he’s performing the role of official photographer this year. But he would, clearly, rather be out here taking part, as he has done every year since the race began. A paragliding accident has forced him to pull out; the hand he damaged is bandaged up, his telephoto lens propped in his cocked wrist. I’m fading fast, and craving some encouragement. I don’t get it from Bruno. ‘Here he is – the Brit!’ he shouts. ‘ What took you so long?’

I hang on and count the last several hundred steps to the final tunnel. It’s long and dark but at the end I know I’ll find what my legs and lungs yearn for: relief from the tyranny of the treppe. We’re spat back out into the sunshine onto a paved path, which meanders, step-free, up to the summit finish. I experience the most incredible and unexpected second wind, tearing past five, 10, 20 competitors plodding, zombie-like, towards the finish line as if in a protracted fall. I respond to the whoops from the surprisingly large crowd gathered by the terrace of the restaurant-hotel, hare it up the final stretch and collapse over the finish line.

I can barely stand, my vision is obscured by sweat and I’m seeing stars. When these clear, I spot a finisher’s tent serving beers. You’ve got to be kidding, I think. Then I take one.

I CAN BARELY STAND, MY VISION IS OBSCURED BY SWEAT AND I’M SEEING STARS. WHEN THESE CLEAR, I SPOT A TENT SERVING BEERS