Vincent Bouillard, 2024 UTMB Champion, Interview

Sarah Brady of iron fire I'm here just the day after the 2024 UTMB with men's Champion vanon Brier vanon how are you pretty good thanks yeah honestly not too bad okay and you won UTMB how does that feel uh yeah I don't know that it's hit quite yet it will take uh forer at least a couple of days who like fully sinking but uh I think just taking it like one thing at a time and uh mostly like being able to enjoy with like friends and family was so special and going through lots of text messages and things it's uh honestly it's pretty special okay that's amazing it's amazing as a French Runner as well to win your big home race yeah I think UTM is gotten so big now and it has a like a pretty broad impact uh even outside of France but uh yeah I guess arriving and it's when towards the end last stations where people starting to like sing along with my name I was like oh okay yeah something yeah had anticipated for that yeah something very special um and just cuz this is our first interview with you um we just like a little background um on you as a runner so I could find like Trail Races going back about 10 years and before that were you like a track runner a Road Runner what's your background yeah so I've ran track uh so I guess for context in France sport in in school is like very small almost like inexistent compared to like the US where it's so big and and uh like a big deal if you do a sport with your school um so I I have I've ran track in cross country but not at any like super competitive level um I have lots of friends that did much better than I did uh but I also I grew up in this area and I've always had just a lots of inspiration to go spend time outside and whether it was hiking with my grandparents when I was a little kid or or um yeah cycling skiing in the winter I've always been like very active over all and never like super competitive per se okay very good so you've always been in the mountains yeah yeah a little bit great um and then I've seen you've raced a bit in the US um you won the gorge waterfalls 100K last year and then I think you won the Kodiak 100 m by like 2 hours yes yes uh yeah so uh um so I met my wife actually teared you see me first time in 2017 and then 2018 happy anniversary thank you she was at Hoka at the time but uh yeah we had we had done long distance for a bit and then I moved to the us both to move in with her and and pursue professional opportunity with Hoka um but I think Gorge waterfall came at the right time of uh postco no racing kind of period and also we had just moved to Porton Oregon as part of like a new new office opening for hookah um and it was a race that sounded really cool to participate because the the free Trail te D notably like putting it on and and trails are just amazing up there so yeah yeah that was a cool one and already in the kind of a the thought was to try and get towards uh okay what would it take to get to UTMB so okay amazing mhm yeah um and then you moved back here earlier this year yes we just moved back uh well moved for for my wife but moved back for me uh yeah in April yeah so very recently yeah very good um and then you're different to a lot of like the men's top Runners cuz you were racing mostly against professional full-time athletes but you have a full-time job with Hoka so how does your training work around that do you think you do less volume than some of the others or how do you fit it in um I don't I I I I guess I don't know everyone schedule like specifically I'm not too much into looking at what everyone is doing super precisely I have enough we have enough friends that like U do that sport very very competitively competitively so I know roughly like what the levels are um for me I try to adapt with how my schedule allows not just with work but also like other things in life like course I absolutely love uh running and trail running but it's also very important for me and for us to to have balance with other things and sometimes we have weekend plans that do not involve any sort of running activity that's coming up in the next few weeks going to be very exciting yeah great um but then my work schedule also allow me to be a bit flexible with uh maybe I don't have always like a 9 to5 very precise thing okay um I think Hoka as a company has especially in the last few years post covid made it very clear that employees should take the time even into the middle of the day to go do their workout or things so um yeah just definitely leaning into that and uh trying to make things relevant from the different aspects yeah okay very good and then just to talk about the race um so you weren't you weren't like someone who started in the middle and crept up you were kind of in the top 10 from from the goal so um in the like opening part of the race was that the plan for you to just try to stay in touch of the Front Runners or we just running your own race and that's where you ended up uh maybe a bit of both I I had ideas of what my splits were were supposed to be and so it's funny because I'd never run this course but like I know it so well because I've followed this race so many time um so I was not going in the full unknown and I didn't feel like I was going way too fast like I I was according to my splits in fact I was thinking that some Runners would go a lot faster at the beginning so I was surprised to be with uh like Tom and then Jim on the run towards the contamine uh but then I also was very focused on like how am I feeling what is the right pacing for me um actually right after Le contamine I took uh maybe a little longer than others at the Ed station and I took the next climb up to cam uh rather easily okay um so another group caught up on me uh ktie shell caught up on me as well and uh it's not until the following climb up to called the that I started to feel better and then um moved up okay um and then when you first found yourself in Podium position um how did that play out was it a case of you like hunting down the runners in front or did people just naturally come back to meet you yeah it's funny cuz I um as I was saying I was really trying to focus on like how I was feeling and what pacing was right for what I thought I could sustain for 20 plus hours um yeah cuz it was not going was like I'm going to run under 20 yeah um but I guess it's starting at C I caught up with a lot of Runners and then eventually uh caught the well Jim was still in the front but uh okay C Jam Tom Ben and I can't remember who there were four of them but uh I felt really easy then when I was following them in the group I felt like really comfortable on the climes and The Descent so um I I didn't I I still don't remember if I wanted to put an attack or if if I just yeah wanted to get in the front of that group but naturally I was just climbing faster when I didn't have someone in front of me okay so then I caught up on the gym and that's where I realized like oh that means that now I'm I'm taking the lead okay okay wow um and then it was around car halfway where you found yourself in front and how did that feel was it was it like kind of scary was there a new pressure in the race then um I think I I was really even when I eventually realized like okay that means that now I'm in the front I kept focusing on like how am I feeling and what is what does that mean for my own race and my pacing and I was trying to put aside the fact that okay for now I'm in the lead but maybe 2 hours from now I'm going to feel like crap and I'll have to deal with a big crisis moment and so if I take 5 minutes or 3 minutes on this time those are three minutes that I took yeah and they're with me um so I think that's kind of mindset that I had is like okay for now I know that I'm not overdoing it I'm reason reason B facing for me and uh kind of being that mindset of if things are going well expect that they're not going to go well for that much longer and prepare for when they're not going well okay that sounds like a good strategy because you can very easily lose like an hour in this race towards the end if you don't take the three minutes when you need it yeah yeah I think I think we were discussing with some friends of how like especially with the timing of the start at 600 p.m. the fact that it's a night race for the the Elite field everyone goes through rough patches of like it's compared to I don't know like Western States this year where it's felt like yeah everyone has it fully DED and it's like on the entire time at UTMB uh you have to navigate maybe more parameters with temperature change not this year as much but a little bit yeah there's a lot of variables yeah and then for a time um past ker and almost as far as valer scene you were ahead of course record Pace uh were you just trying to ignore that and keep cool okay yeah yeah and were people telling you the whole time I think I was still in that same mindset of like at some point I'm going to fall apart and I'll have to manage that okay uh you didn't really well yeah I think I was trying to get information on what the splits were behind to just get an idea of okay like how am I putting more Gap or is are they coming back on me um but I had this firm idea that like at some point I'm going to not be able to hold the space because I was kind of like dividing by section I was like okay I'm and push the climb up to kere and then the whole descent okay if I feel good I'll try and push push push okay but um I was not thinking of the timing the final time I think maybe yeah as I got closer I was like wait how how much is left how how much do I have time okay maybe I can finish on the 20 hours and just that I think Jim deserves to have this course record to be honest and I think also that the course might change a little bit from year to year but as I got closer I was like it would be really cool to run out the 20 hours course yeah it's amazing um and then how was like the final descent into shamony and running through the town um so I uh now famously because of the FED station I forgot flask at valorin I did have my full capacity because I had a zip lock that uh is also capacity to carry water but I was very dehydrated on the climb up to left oh no so uh I think with the heat and all the people around like was starting to get like a little yeah just dizzy with dehydration and so with that context I was even more focused on not falling not tripping on anything and I ended up tripping on the Rock literally like in the last minute on The Descent like just before we got on the road yeah and it was so you just fell into town I I I didn't fall but I hit like really hard and it was actually like super painful for like the first part of my run into town so I was like it's like ruining the moment of just tion that's funny because the women's leader finished hobbling as well yeah at first I was like I just literally broke my toe like there's no other way this is so painful but I prefer that it happened in the last mile than in the first yeah for sure okay brilliant um and then I know you've probably just taken time to absorb all of this but have you thought about the rest of the season is there another race in you is this it season as in calendar year no I I mean right now I'm really looking forward to to not having our schedule revolved around my training and having like other things that we set on the agenda uh we were discussing we just moved here from the states and we actually have some like friends coming to visit and uh we have a new apartment that we're like building out and stuff so um it's nice to have other areas of focus and uh yeah I'll take the time to digest before thinking of other things that I'll put on a racing calendar and whatnot yeah that will come when it comes very good yeah that sounds reasonable um thanks so much for fitting Us in I'm sure you're very in demand today and enjoy your recovery thank you so much yeah pleasure talking to you you too