Le Marathon des Sables, an attempt to conquer the desert
Morocco, Sports, 3/30/1999

Le marathon des sables, the race to conquer the desert, will be held this year April 4 through 10 with a record participation of 600 persons.

Athletes, marchers, racers, youth and elderly, men and women will participate in this physical and psychological endurance test and will live through an unparalleled adventure that offers fabulous landscapes and provides opportunity to discover the splendor and magic of the desert.

This week-long footrace across 220 km grueling desert terrain in southern Morocco is a test of courage, determination and enthusiasm. The participants, carrying all their food, clothes and sleeping gear on their backs, will only receive a nine-liter ration of water each day, and spend the nights on the hard desert ground under an open-sided Berber tent.

Competitors will also have to wade across soft sand dunes and dodge rocks in dried-up river beds during daily race and must above all face up the sand storms that blow unheralded.

The participants in the marathon des sables who are aged this year between 17 and 76 do not seek to shatter records, but to reach the finish line. They walk or run to test their own capacity, challenge the desert and be plunged in exoticism. Some of the participants come to uphold causes they defend such as struggle against smoking or research on cancer.

Besides competitors from a dozen European countries, twenty Moroccans will participate in the marathon, including Brahim el Joual, a butcher from Fez, who has participated in all the editions of the marathon since it was first launched in 1986. The Ahansal brothers, winners of the 1997 and 1998 editions, will also participate in the event.

The event will be covered by 18 television channels, and fans can directly follow the adventure on internet.

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