CHARLIE ENGLE

By Jedd Ferris

North Carolina's Charlie Engle ran 4,300 miles across the Sahara Desert to bring clean water to Africa.

On February 20, 2007, Charlie Engle dipped his hand in the Red Sea—marking the conclusion of an epic 111-day journey that found him running across the entire Sahara Desert. He covered over 4,300 miles and crossed six countries: Senegal, Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Libya, and Egypt. Accompanied by two fellow ultra runners, Ray Zahab of Canada and Kevin Lin of Taiwan, Engle led the trio through an unparalleled running endeavor, often battling extreme conditions that ranged from 120-degree heat to blinding sandstorms. Along the way, he met with native Africans living in extreme poverty in some of the harshest natural conditions on earth. The team trekked through a part of the world where people carry water—which is often polluted and diseased—on their backs and heads for miles each day. The goal of the expedition was to raise money and awareness for the water crisis in Africa. 


A 45-year-old from the northwest countryside suburbs of Greensboro, N.C., Charlie Engle is using adventure to save others, much as it saved himself. As a self-declared addict, drugs and alcohol dominated his life in his late 20s, but when Engle approached his 30th birthday, he decided to turn his personality of overindulgence toward healthier pursuits. Since then, he has raced and won many of the world’s most extreme adventure races and ultra marathons, including Eco Challenge, Brazil’s Jungle Marathon, and the Badwater Ultra Marathon in Death Valley, California. 


These days Engle’s focus is on extending the mission of the Sahara Run by telling whomever will listen about what he witnessed in Africa (an appearance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno was a good start). He is co-founder of the nonprofit H2O Africa, and he’s a representative for Bono’s ONE Campaign to end world hunger. The Sahara journey is the subject of an upcoming documentary, Running the Sahara, which was directed by Academy Award-winner James Moll and narrated by Hollywood hero Matt Damon. 


“I have a couple of gifts,” says Engle. “I can run and I can talk. If I can make a difference with those things, that’s what I’m going to do. I’ve been given an opportunity to do what I’m passionate about for a living and actually make a difference in the world.”

BRO: What came first in your desire to do the Sahara Run—the expedition or the cause?


CE: I try to be brutally honest about this. In truth I haven’t always been a great humanitarian. I am an adventurer and a runner. The first desire was to do something that had never been done before. This started off as very much an ego-based expedition. 


But I’m happy to say it morphed into something that has had a great impact on the lives of many people in the areas of Africa that we ran through. People stand up for charities all the time that they don’t know anything about. I needed to experience it for myself, and being in Africa and witnessing firsthand hundreds of situations where people lacked clean water and basic sanitation has done nothing but reinforce my commitment to make it better. 


BRO: On the first day, was it daunting to think about the mileage ahead of you? 


CE: The first day was one of the scariest days of my life, and I’m not a person that’s prone to fear. The thought that went through my mind was, ‘Oh my God, what have I gotten us into?’ We were on a beach in a bustling city in Senegal, standing on a horrendously polluted beach, surrounded by everything from dead animals to human feces. Right then I realized what an incredible undertaking it was going to be. 


BRO: What did you do in the way of mental and physical training? 


CE: Training for this, as you might imagine it, would have been counterproductive. I’m normally 180 pounds. I can’t go out and run 120-mile weeks in training or my body will break down. Yet when I got out to the Sahara I was running 350-mile weeks. The mind can push you forward. You need to have the body in shape, and I do work out at least two hours a day, but having the mind in shape is more important. I’ve been racing for 30 years, and I know how to suffer. 


BRO: Why was a 10-day running acclimation period required in the desert?


CE: I forced us to not jump into running 50 miles a day right away, because I felt like our bodies would need time to acclimate. We started with 115-120-degree days for the first 30 days. To experience that without giving our bodies a chance to adjust would have been foolish. We still ran 22 miles on day one and 31 on day two. We were up to 40 miles by day four. Once we started moving and got a few miles behind us, the anxiety started to wane. We decided to just take it one step at a time and worry about particular problems later.


BRO: With such a severe climate, how did you maintain physical form and nutrition?


CE: There was a tremendous amount of physical sickness right away. Some of it came from dehydration. We were entering territory that no one had entered before, so the massive amount of fluids and calories that we needed was off any known chart. I drank over 1,400 liters of Gatorade. I needed to eat 10,000 calories a day just to maintain my fitness. That’s almost impossible. I lost 30 pounds in the first 30 days. You could look at this thing like a yo-yo. In our main core group we had the three runners and three assistants, which included a logistics expert, a doctor, and a trainer/massage therapist. The support crew would drive up 10K, and we would run to catch up to it to eat and drink. We had to do that continuously for the food and fluid, but also for the safety factor of not getting lost in the desert. 


We also had Mohammed Ixa, a Tuareg guide, who basically led us across and kept us out of trouble. He also made sure we could always find water and food. Many times we had trouble finding food and water. We had to search for wells, and I’m not normally a big meat eater, but the lack of protein out there was really hurting us. Sometimes the goat that was riding in our supply truck one day was in our stew pot the next. 


BRO: What was an average day like?


CE: Our days started off at 4am. I was the alarm clock everyday. We’d eat and be running by 5. Our running day wouldn’t end until 8 or 9 at night. We’d take breaks but continuous movement was the goal. We would sleep for five or six hours and then wake up and do it again. I slept outside for the first 60 days, and then it got too cold. The three runners had individual tents, and then we had a main dome tent, where we took our meals when it was too hot or windy. The support crew would have camp set up for us at the end of everyday.


BRO: Was the Sahara Desert different than you expected it to be? 


CE: The Sahara Desert is nine different eco-systems. It was completely across the board. Everyone always has this image of Lawrence of Arabia with these massive sand dunes, but that was only about 25 percent of it. Besides that there was a lot of volcanic rock and some serious mountainous terrain in Libya and Western Egypt, where we had elevations up to 4,000 feet. In the first month we had temperatures over 110 every day, but by the time we reached Libya we had lows in the 20s every morning. We also went through what we affectionately referred to as hell grass, which was this needle-ended grass that kept poking into our socks and even through our gaiters. We had to stop multiple times and pull out hundreds of these things. 


We also encountered every animal that exists in the Sahara. We were swarmed by locusts that were the size of small birds. They would get so thick that we would have to take cover. 


BRO: How was the chemistry between the three runners? 


CE: We first met each other as competitors. We got to know each other through these seven-day races across the Gobi Desert in China and the Amazon Jungle in Brazil. There’s a huge bond that’s created through mutual suffering. It’s one of those absolutes in life. That’s why you see guys who’ve fought in wars together form a bond that can’t be broken. I would’ve never considered doing this with someone I didn’t know incredibly well. 


We were together for 111 days, and we were never more than 100 feet away from one another. Most people couldn’t even do that with their wife and kids, much less other people in a stressful situation. We had to learn how to talk about the situation and not dwell on it. We chose to be there, and we understood it was our responsibility. We were on a mission, and the goal on a daily basis was to get through to the end of the day.


I’m a firm believer in communication. I was the expedition leader, and I made it clear that—while it was a democracy to a certain degree—ultimately someone had to make a decision as to how things would continue. I made some hard decisions, and there was some arguing. We were running up to 50 miles a day, everyday, and we all lost the ability to have that buffer that comes with normal life. When we did hit a problem, we had to hit it head on. That communication that we established is what saved us. 


BRO: How did you keep your minds occupied through hours of pushing it each day?


CE: Ray talks just as much as I do, so the two of us sucked the oxygen out of any space that was in the air, while Kevin was pretty quiet. I had 1,500 songs on my iPod, but the two of them only had around 150, so we ended up swapping a lot. I also had audio books on mine. We did what we had to do to get through it. Sometimes we would run next to each other and talk, and other times we would put on music and not say 10 sentences to each other through the entire day.


BRO: How did you hold up physically over the 111 days? Any injuries?


CE: Most of them were overuse injuries—tendonitis of one type or another. It came in everything, including feet, ankles, shins, knees, quads, and hips. We managed to stay injury free from the waist up, but out of 111 days we only had nine days where all three of us were healthy. We still ran almost the entire distance. The running was not fast; maybe a 9-10-minute-per-mile pace. Terrain changes caused most of the problems. In Mauritania we ran 500K on a paved road. Then we moved from that to 10 days of ankle-deep sand; more than 2,000 miles of this run were on soft, deep sand. People can equate it to running at the beach, and we were doing it for 50 miles a day. The transition to different surfaces wreaked havoc on our bodies. 


BRO: Did your body ever seem to get used to doing this day after day?


CE: Yes. The body is an amazing machine. I’ve been doing this hardcore adventure stuff for 10 years now, and what I’ve learned is, if you keep moving forward and give your body the fuel it needs, your body, on its own, will adjust to the stress of the situation. If the mind will participate, it will push the body forward. After that initial 10 days, when we woke up, it felt like our bodies were expecting to do 50 miles of running. It was an amazing thing to notice, because before that, it felt like we were getting worse and worse physically. 


BRO: If you had to pick a few specific moments out there that were your favorites, what would they be?


CE: We ran through this old oasis town, Faschi, in Niger, and we were met by over 500 children that followed us through the entire town. It was very uplifting. Being surrounded by kids is such a great thing, especially when we were in the doldrums of fatigue.


Also, halfway through the run on Christmas day, our significant others—Ray’s wife and Kevin’s and my girlfriends—flew into Niger and spent a week with us in the desert. At that point we were so deprived of interaction with anyone except each other, we needed that company.


BRO: What are some of the most shocking images from those living in the desert that have stuck with you?


CE: People over there want the same things that we want. When you ask people over there why they want irrigation systems, it’s not so that they have clean drinking water. It’s so their children can have a better life. The poorest homeless person in the United States has access to clean water. The fact there are 1.2 billion people over there that don’t have clean water is an incredible statistic. 


We encountered a seven-year-old boy in Niger out in the desert by himself, manning his family’s camp. His mom and dad were off traveling for four days, just to go get some water, so they left him to watch the livestock. This was not an unusual situation. That was his job, and seeing it changed me forever, because it made me understand what life was really like out there. I have boys that are 12 and 15, and I don’t like to leave them alone for an evening. It pointed out so clearly what our lives are like in the United States. I don’t think we should feel guilty about what we have, but we have to use our gifts to make others better. 


BRO: You ran through minefields and war zones. How did you deal with dangerous situations? 


CE: We encountered minefields a few times, and most of them were marked. Each country provided some armed guards to watch over us. At one point in Libya I went behind a vehicle to pee, and I crossed a fence that was down. The guard with us at the time whistled to me as I was peeing and waved me back. He only spoke Arabic, so he raised his arms and made a boom sound. I walked back over and noticed that the downed fence had a clear sign denoting mines in the area.


In general there is a lot going on in that part of Africa. There is internal and political strife in each country, and there are a lot of rebels. When we were in Mauritania, they had their first free election since 1960. Many times when we were running we were passed by trucks filled with armed men, and every single time my heart would beat out of my chest a little bit. 


The other biggest danger was the possibility of getting lost. On a few occasions we went in opposite directions from our crew. One time in particular was when we were in the midst of a 21-day sandstorm. We had straight-line wind of over 40 mph everyday. We were wearing goggles and full cover. It was miserable. We couldn’t breathe. Every time we stopped I drank Gatorade to get the grit out of my teeth. We eventually had to pull the support vehicle back to stay right in front of us, because we couldn’t see anything. 


BRO: Did having the film crew out there affect the expedition?


CE: We had a rule of division between the production and the expedition. We basically did not interact at all. We agreed that it was best if we fight our own battles. If the three of us were arguing, one of us wasn’t allowed to leave camp and go hang out with the film crew. To me that wouldn’t be organic. Three or four days into it, we forgot they were there.


We did agree to be interviewed a few times throughout the run, but I told the film crew we were not doing anything twice. There would be no running over that sand dune again. This was a hardcore, straight documentary. 


BRO: You used extreme adventure as a way to overcome drug and alcohol addiction. Why is ultra running and extreme adventure such an important part of your life?


CE: I try to remind people that I’m not obsessed with this. I am addicted to the results of running but not to running itself. Running has been my vehicle to see the world, and it’s also something I use to make any major decision in my life. Answers come to you in the middle of a run, and I use it as my vetting process. All of life’s greatest lessons are learned through suffering. I take that to the next degree, and through that process I hope to learn about myself. 


In a way, running did save my life. I quit drinking and doing heavy amounts of cocaine when I was 29, but even during the horrendous years of my 20s I did the Boston Marathon. I still identified myself as a runner, but spiritually I was a disaster. Finally I realized there was a lot more that I wanted to accomplish. Some of the traits that make me an addict—being a determined, forceful person—are ones that I’ve learned to use in my favor. That’s what saw me through the Sahara—a weird combination of addiction, determination, and stubbornness that allowed me to push through the hard times. 


BRO: How did this journey change you? 


CE: Now I feel like I have a responsibility. I have no fame whatsoever, but what I do have is a little notoriety in this endurance world, and I have a big mouth, also. Whenever I get a chance to talk to people, I use the opportunity to tell people that we all have a social and moral responsibility to use the gifts we have to make life better for other people. I went to the Sahara Desert hoping this would make me a better person, and that’s what happened. My focus is less self-centered, and now that I’ve seen the problem for myself, I have no choice but to do something about it. 


BRO: How do you top running the Sahara?


CE: On March 22, which is World Water Day, I will leave from Seattle in an attempt to break a 28-year-old record for the fastest crossing of the United States ever on foot. To do that I’ll have to average 70 miles per day for 45 consecutive days. It’s a difficult undertaking that many have unsuccessfully tried. 


It comes back to the journey, and the belief that all things worth knowing are learned through suffering. As if life wasn’t hard enough, I will continue to pursue things that are even more difficult. •