Snowy marathon held in China's 'pole of cold'

By Zhao Xiao (chinadaily.com.cn)

Updated: 2017-01-23

The 2016 China Pole of Cold Half Marathon was recently held on the snowfields in Aoluguya Ewenki, an ethnic town in Genhe of Inner Mongolia, drawing around 400 runners to participate in the half and mini marathons.

Participants run on snow-covered high-altitude mountains during the 2016 China Pole of Cold Half Marathon held on snowfields in Aoluguya Ewenki ethnic town in Genhe city of Inner Mongolia. [Photo/Xinhua]

During the men’s half marathon, Bi Fengyang crossed the finish line first with a time of 1:16:27, and Yang Bowen and Li Zhenguo won second and third places. Li Xin, Liu Fen, and Cong Guili took the top three places during the women’s half marathon.

As China’s pole of cold, Genhe is located at the latitude of 50 to 52 degrees north, west of the Greater Hinggan Mountains. It is adjacent to Mohe county (52-53 degrees in north latitude) in Heilongjiang province, where has been crowned with the title of “China’s north pole”.

Despite being slightly lower than Mohe county in latitude, Genhe sits at a higher altitude and this makes it the coldest place in China.

Its yearly average temperature is below 5.3 degrees Celsius, with the highest temperature on record hitting below 58 degrees Celsius. The ice-bound season usually lasts for 210 days every year.

With a population of 167,000, Genhe has abundant mineral and metal resources including lead, zinc, iron, silver, molybdenum, copper, and uranium.

The reserves of lead and zinc have been detected reaching around 20 million tons and the limestone and dolomite are estimated at 170 million tons.

As China’s only reindeer tribe, the Aoluguya Ewenki ethnic town has a population of 1,465, and living in the town are 308 members of the Ewenki ethnic group. People there mainly live on raising reindeer and hunting in the wild.

A runner embraces the chilly air of “China’s cold pole” during the half marathon held on the snowfields in Genhe of Inner Mongolia. [Photo/Xinhua]

Runners cross the snow-covered high-altitude mountains during the 2016 China Pole of Cold Half Marathon held on the snowfields in Genhe of Inner Mongolia. [Photo/Xinhua]