Ultra Trail du Mont-Blanc Race report: Tom Evans

British athlete Tom Evans is no stranger to the ultra running scene, and he took on this year’s Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc (UTMB) with a bang.

Having come third in the 2017 Marathon des Sables, Tom has continued to take podium places in well known events across the world. In August 2022 Tom took third place in UTMB with a time of 20:34:36. Ultrarunner Magazine caught up with Tom to discuss his strategy for the race and how he managed to recover so well after surgery. 

Did you have a race strategy going into UTMB? 

It’s very easy going into a 10 km or a half marathon with a race strategy. Yes, things can go wrong, but even if you’re the slowest person in the race it’s not going to take you that long relatively. I probably had about 10 different strategies for UTMB depending on if it was going to be wet or dry and how things panned out. My plan was a bit like a very complicated flow chart that looked like an old fashioned family tree. You follow it along and ask, ‘has this happened? Yes or no?’ Yes you go one way, no you go the other way and just keep going down.