CAMPBELLS aren’t universally popular in Glencoe but at least one member of the clan hopes to buck that trend this weekend. A native of Skye now domiciled in Edinburgh, 2016 British trail running champion Donnie Campbell will have no shortage of local support as he runs the 100km route, with 4,000m of vertical climbing thrown in, of the Ben Nevis Ultra Skyrace, just one instalment of the four-race Salomon Skyline Scotland event based in Scotland’s most atmospheric and awe-inspiring glen this weekend.

Campbell left Kinlochleven at 6am this morning, and all going well will have returned there by 5pm this evening. After an 11-hour jaunt fuelled by carbohydrate drinks, energy gels and the caffeine intake from maybe a couple of cans of Red Bull, who knows he may even reward himself for completing his final race of a mind-boggling season. “After the race, just because it is my last one of the year, I might partake in a nice bottle of red wine,” he says.

Ultra running is the kind of fast growing pursuit which is slowly capturing the imagination in this diverse, modern sporting landscape and Campbell is precisely the kind of flinty, independent figure who it holds in its thrall. A former shinty player, Royal Marine and mountain rescue worker, Campbell has found his calling as an elite trail runner and coach and would probably run through brick walls too if any happened to be in his way. This is a man who recently climbed 24 Munros in less than 24 hours, the kind of distinction which most of us would be pretty happy to achieve in a lifetime.

The thing he rates most likely to stop him recording podium finish in the Ben Nevis Ultra today - a new race on the Skyrunner World Series which has been fashioned along retro lines - is a painful, nagging foot problem called morton’s neuroma on his right foot which has dogged him for a year or so. In layman’s terms, this means painful nerve damage between two of his metatarsals. Reason enough, you might think, to get a doctor’s line and opt out of the whole thing in the first place.

“I have been carrying an injury for the last year so I’m looking at an operation probably in the winter to try to get it fixed,” said Campbell. “When I have been running for three or four hours it starts getting really inflamed and really numb.

“Because it is nerve pain, I know it is not doing any long term damage,” he added. “But there have been times that the pain was so excruciating that it has stopped me running, and pull out of a couple of races. At times it was so bad that I haven’t been able to put it on the floor really, not even able to walk.

“If my foot is okay I am hoping to get on the podium - that is what I am aiming for at the moment and I think that is achievable. But if everything starts hurting, then I just don’t know. Because it is a new race it is very hard to tell how fast it is going to go. I know most of the route but I have never done it in one go. So it is a bit more tricky to figure out.

“Because the race is in Scotland close to where I train I will have some support. It will be great to see them all cheering me on. The home runners will get a bit of advantage, because we know the course, know the weather, and will have the home support.”

Perhaps given Campbell’s backstory - exploring the Cullins as a youngster, tours of duty in Iraq, and putting his head back in the danger zone amongst the swinging camans on the shinty field - it was inevitable he would end up doing something extreme like this. He is as interested as anyone else in the psychology which drives him to do what he does, one of a number of Scottish athletes who have found something of value in Dr Steve Peters’ influential book The Chimp Paradox.

“I like challenging myself, pitting myself against the elements,” he said. “Obviously coming from Skye, you are used to the wind and the rain and the snow, there is something about training in that kind of weather, can you cope with it? Then, once you have done it, you feel a great sense of accomplishment. After a long hard run or a long hard day in miserable weather, you start feeling good, feeling better for it.

“I don’t know if I had that kind of determination and mindset before I went to the Marines anyway - it is a hard question,” added Campbell. “It probably helped a wee bit but I kind of had that anyway. I used to play shinty to quite a high level, I represented Scotland against the Irish hurling team. So whatever sport or discipline I do, I want to give my best.

Campbell still follows Skye Camanachd, and wearily notes their recent Camanachd Cup semi-final defeat to Newtonmore.”In shinty, if you are playing against someone like Lochaber or Kilmallie, you might fear a bit more for your life!” he said. “But each poses its own separate risks of danger. Obviously lumbering about on a ridge, you kind of take your own responsibility. In shinty you can be doing your own thing and someone can blind side you. If I wasn’t running I would go back and play shinty - I just can’t do both. And I love running more.”

Be it Kilimanjaro, the Namib desert, ultra running has given Campbell a great vantage point from which to view the world. Rather than be enslaved by world series points, he picks and chooses the races he wants to do. His personal favourite locations include Mont Blanc, the Dolomites and Glencoe itself, even if Scotland doesn’t always boast the clearest of blue skies. “That is part of Scotland, the midges, the mist,” he said. “That is part of what makes Scotland so great, the way sunlight hits the mist, that kind of atmospheric stuff. It isn’t always clear blue skies. We get a variety of weather up here.”

So what kind of variation does the forecast have in store for him today? “It is looking like a nice Scottish September day,” he says. “Overcast, with a wee light shower in the afternoon. I hope it is windy, though. I can cope with the rain, I can cope with the cold and I can cope with the snow, but I just don’t like the midges.”