This Woman is the Adventurer of 2017: Mira Rai!

How often does a girl from a remote village in Nepal win the title of National Geographic Adventurer of the Year? Not very often, but Mira Rai has changed that. Nepali trail runner Mira became the 2017 People's Choice Adventurer of the Year.

Trail running is now one of the world’s favourite adventure sports. It is an extreme distance running. Think marathons, but this is much longer and across steep, rocky terrain. Therefore, it is also called mountain or fell running. In the US alone, the number of trail runners is more than 6 million. There are trail running marathons across the globe. Runners run through picturesque terrains and trails of 50 km or more. One day Mira Rai chanced upon one such trail running and her life changed forever.

Mira grew up in rural Nepal. By age 12, she quit school. She was the eldest daughter of five children and life was hard for her. As a child, she would do chores at home. She used to carry water, sacks of rice grain and firewood up and down the rocky mountainous terrain. It was hard work but also great training for a future trail runner.

In the early 2000s, a civil war began. Rebels came to her village when she was 14. Mira decided to join them and became a child soldier. In her three years with the army, she didn't see combat, but she practised karate and ran in battalion races as part of her training. Then the peace came. Mira went home and kept running every day. One day, she finally got her big break, by chance. Mira was running outside Kathmandu when two trail runners invited her to enter her first race. She had no special shoes or training for such a race. She was also the only woman in the competition. Against all odds, she beat everyone, even the men. Thus, she won the admiration of many people. She’s been running since then. She has been a top ultra-runner. She has earned titles in difficult mountain races up to 110 kilometres long.

Today the running world recognizes her as a high-elevation trail racing phenomenon. And she is on a mission to help both women and men of Nepal through sports.