New Zealand ultrarunner Sophie Woods has officially become the fastest person to complete the 2,000km Via Alpina, a grueling network of trails winding through eight European countries. Woods finished the journey in 28 days, 17 hours, and 59 minutes, significantly eclipsing the previous overall record of 35 days and 21 hours held by British runner Jake Catterall, as well as the previous women’s best of 38 days set by Dutch runner Tessa Caspers.
The 42-year-old athlete began her trek on 4 July in Muggia, near Trieste, Italy. Her path took her through Slovenia, Austria, Germany, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, France, and Monaco. The expedition was fraught with peril; during one stage in Switzerland, Woods and her photographer, Zoe Salt, were caught in a severe thunderstorm on a mountain peak. With lightning striking nearby and no available shelter, Woods admitted she feared for their lives, prompting her to run at high speed to escape the conductive rock face.
The journey also presented bizarre and exhausting obstacles, including an incident in Austria where Woods was besieged by a swarm of horse flies during a heatwave. Struggling with physical exhaustion and the stress of managing accommodation, she eventually resorted to using ferns to defend herself against the insects while navigating the mountains. Unable to outrun them, Woods put away her hiking poles and grabbed two handfuls of ferns. “I spent the next hour just whacking myself with these ferns everywhere and I looked completely nuts. It was horrendous.” Throughout the ordeal, Woods maintained a rigorous schedule, often running for up to 20 hours a day while consuming 7,000 calories to sustain her efforts. She was supported by her husband, George Woods, and Salt, who managed her logistics, cooling, and nutrition.
For Woods, the record-breaking run represented a personal turning point. After moving from her native Christchurch to the UK at age 20, she eventually settled in Andorra. Having spent a decade competing in major endurance events such as the 170km Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc and the 330km Tor des Géants, she had begun to lose her passion for the sport by 2025. This decline in motivation followed the couple's difficult experience with infertility and IVF treatments, which left her feeling disconnected from her own body.
Her husband suggested the Via Alpina challenge as a way to refocus, a decision that Woods credits with restoring her self-respect and love for her physical capabilities. By the third week of the run, she described her body as having accepted the intense demands of the trail. Upon arriving in Monaco on 1 August, she felt an overwhelming sense of relief that the mission was accomplished. “You’ve used up everything … so it just was a sense of relief I don’t have to run any more,” she says. The international attention surrounding her success, including gaining over 55,000 Instagram followers, has surprised the runner, who noted that while these feats seem normal within the trail-running community, the public response has highlighted the extraordinary nature of the achievement.
It was an Odyssean feat. As well as battling thunderstorms and several heatwaves, Woods faced another unexpected challenge.
Then, a swarm of blood-sucking horse flies descended.
