The Legacy
Before we spoke about bonds,
we learned what it means to hold people.
La Ultra — The High. Ladakh. 11 editions.
Legacy at a Glance
La Ultra — The High was started for the world's most demanding self-sufficient adventure race. Distances ranging from 50 - 333 km. Altitudes: 3500-5500m. Average finisher rate: 67%.
Moments from La Ultra
A glimpse into the legacy and spirit of La Ultra across the Himalayas.
Moving Mountains Within - La Ultra - The High | 10th edition - 2019
About La Ultra
The Institution Behind the Journey
La Ultra is globally recognised as one of the world's most demanding endurance events.
It has been rated among the top 10 toughest races in the world by Red Bull.
Held in the high-altitude desert of Leh-Ladakh, La Ultra unfolds in the Indian Himalayas at elevations exceeding 17,500 feet, across distances of 111, 222, 333, and 555 kilometres, crossing one, two, three, or five high mountain passes respectively.
Over the years, La Ultra has hosted ultra-runners from 24 countries, all drawn by its defining philosophy:
minimal distraction, maximal honesty.
Why La Ultra Was Never Just a Race
After his first encounter with the 333 km at La Ultra - The High, Mark Steven Woolley wrote:
"You really have created the world's finest masterpiece of ultra-running, a canvas 72 hours long and 333 kilometres wide in the Indian Himalayas. Upon this canvas are the runners, the artists, painting their way across the most majestic mountains.
Art is meant to be perfect. Anything less isn't art. It's a mess."
What makes this reflection extraordinary is that it came not from a spectator, but from someone who had lived inside that canvas.
A PhD in Computational Molecular Physics, a teacher of Physics and Theory of Knowledge in the International Baccalaureate system in Spain, and an adventurer named Adventurer of the Year in 2016 by the Federación Andaluza de Montañismo, he has also lived at the far edge of endurance sport.
Mark had already experienced the world's most iconic ultra-marathons. He would go on to cover 1,316 kilometres across five editions of La Ultra, including multiple attempts at the 333 km. He knew what endurance looked like when stripped to muscle and will.
Yet La Ultra revealed something else.
In another reflection, Mark put words to what many runners feel but rarely articulate:
"It's not about the runner. It's about the team moving forward.
There are several layers of teams. A huge creative organisation. And then it filters down, and the runner, at the end of the day, just puts a pair of legs out there.
If you don't have people around you, you don't go anywhere. It's just not doable."
Since 2010, La Ultra has never been about individual heroics alone. It has been about care at a depth endurance sport rarely acknowledges. About layers of human presence. About holding people through uncertainty, vulnerability, fear, and fatigue.
Perhaps that's because Rajat Chauhan never approached La Ultra merely as a doctor or a race organiser.
He approached it as an artist.
Feeling the terrain.
Feeling the runner.
Sensing when to push, when to protect, and when to simply hold space.
Bonding Runs are not a new idea born elsewhere.
They are the same canvas, brought closer to everyday life.
When you remove altitude and extremity, what remains is the truth Mark captured so precisely:
movement is never individual, endurance is always relational, and nothing meaningful is doable alone.
Bonding Runs begin exactly there.
Bonding Runs carry this same philosophy forward, not at altitude, but in everyday life, with the people who matter most.
After COVID, La Ultra underwent an important realisation.
Moving Mountains Within meant different things to different people.
La Ultra expanded to include distances of 11, 22, 33 and 55 kilometres, creating its largest and most curated bonding edition yet.
More than 150 participants gathered in Ladakh, with all events hosted at The Grand Dragon Ladakh.
Bonding Runs are not a departure from La Ultra.
They are its natural evolution.
Where La Ultra tests limits,
Bonding Runs deepen meaning.
Together, they form one continuum,
from endurance to presence,
from solitude to shared journey.
The Bridge
La Ultra connected runners to
Bonding Runs connect them to a different question:
Films & Press
La Ultra has been documented through The Times and featured in national and international media, both in cinema. Its reputation.
The story hasn't changed. The work has, simply found new levels.
"Some journeys change your location.
Some change your relationships."
