Easter Backyard 2027

The bells are coming back from Rome, chocolates are hiding at the bottom of gardens… and up on the heights of Cahors, a very different hunt begins: the hunt for loops! 🐣 Over Easter weekend, the Easter Backyard sets up base camp at the top of Mont Saint-Cyr, a natural balcony over the prefecture of the Lot, in Occitania. Between late March and mid-April, depending on the Easter calendar, the Quercy region flips a coin between the first spring sunshine and a surprise rain shower 🌦️, with nights that are still chilly once the light fades. Keep a windbreaker within reach: in an event that can stretch late into the night, the thermometer drops faster than your pace 🥶.

One distance, no fixed finish line. The principle of a backyard can be summed up in one sentence: a 6.7 km loop to swallow in under an hour, a new start right on the next hour, again and again, until only one runner remains ⏱️. The course winds over Mont Saint-Cyr, the hill that overlooks the city. A geographic wink: Cahors sits snugly in a tight loop of the Lot river, which wraps around it to the west, south and east, so of course, going around in circles here is part of local tradition 🔄. On the menu: a trail run on the hill’s paths, alongside the GR 65, also known as the Via Podiensis, the pilgrims’ route from Le Puy-en-Velay to Compostela 🥾

The concept comes straight from Tennessee, where Lazarus Lake came up with Big's Backyard Ultra: 24 loops of 6.7 km linked together make exactly 100 miles 🇺🇸. No time-based podium, no target pace—the winner is simply the last one still able to head out again. From the seventh loop, you’ve already gone beyond marathon distance, and the toughest slip into the world of ultra-trail without even realizing it 🤯. At the helm, you’ll find Lot of Sports, the leisure center based on Mont Saint-Cyr, between disc golf, orienteering courses and archery 🎯. In other words, people who know every stone on the hill. The Easter Backyard race village plays it efficient: aid station between each loop, rest area, refreshment stand, changing rooms… and a festive atmosphere made of mutual support, encouragement, and a few heavy, meaningful silences as the hours go by.

Between two recovery sessions, the Lot’s food steps in for comfort 🍽️. Cahors wine, nicknamed "black wine" for the dark color of its malbec, will patiently wait for your final lap 🍷. Add a nice runny rocamadour 🧀, a getaway to Saint-Cirq-Lapopie perched above the Lot, then head to the Valentré bridge. Its construction dragged on for nearly 70 years, to the point that legend has it the architect made a pact with the devil, and that the devil, cheated, returns each night to pry loose the last stone of the central tower 😈. Coming back relentlessly to the same place, again and again? A true backyarder profile. The Easter bells also know where to land: Cahors is the birthplace of a pope, John XXII, who settled in Avignon rather than Rome, but nobody’s perfect ⛪.

Here, you won’t need a basket for the hunt: you’ll only collect loops… right up to the very last one! 🏆