Running / Endurance

The Mount Cameroon Race of Hope is one of the hardest one-day mountain races anywhere, a run from the town of Buea to the 4095 meter summit and back in a single morning. First held in 1973 and once sponsored by Guinness, it now draws several hundred Cameroonian and international runners who cover about 38 kilometers and some 3000 meters of ascent from the Molyko stadium, up through forest and lava fields to the crater rim, then straight back down. The winning men finish the whole climb and descent in under four and a half hours, an effort that has made local champions into national heroes. There is no organizer selling a package here; you enter through the athletics federation, line up at the stadium, and run the mountain that towers over the coast. For spectators, race day turns Buea into a carnival of drummers and crowds lining the lower slopes.

The Sierra Leone Marathon turns Makeni into the country's running capital for a week each year, and it is one of the most purposeful races in the world. Founded and run by the charity Street Child, every entrant runs in support of the same cause, funding education and child welfare across Sierra Leone, which makes the event rare in a sport crowded with commercial fields. The course loops out from Makeni city center into the surrounding hills and villages of the north, a hot, hard, red-dirt route where runners are cheered through communities that rarely see visitors. There are full and half marathon distances plus 10k and 5k options and a 75-kilometer cycle challenge, so the day suits serious marathoners and first-timers alike. Voted best international event at the 2017 Running Awards, it pairs a genuine physical challenge with a hands-on look at the projects the entry fees pay for. For a runner who wants the race to mean something beyond a finish time, this is the reason to come to Makeni.

Trail 100 Andorra by UTMB is the reason to be in Ordino in June, the Andorran round of the global UTMB World Series and one of the toughest, most scenic weeks on the trail-running calendar. The event took over from the long-running Andorra Ultra Trail and now runs five distances out of Ordino, from a 10 kilometer taster to the 105 kilometer Ultra with 6,800 meters of climbing over the high ridges of the Pyrenees. Runners chase Running Stones toward a place at the UTMB Mont-Blanc finals in Chamonix, and the northern parish of stone villages fills with an international field. Whether you race the short course or watch the Ultra grind through the mountain aid stations, it is trail running at altitude in one of Europe's smallest countries.

The Samaria Run descends the gorge itself, 21.6km from Omalos to the sea, on a route you cannot race anywhere else in Europe.