As sometimes seems to happen when I’m preparing for a race, things don’t go to plan. Four weeks out from the event, I had a surgical procedure to remove some skin cancers from the back of my right hand. Then, a fortnight later, I had another procedure to remove more. That meant a fair bit of time off from having long runs and plenty of tough hills. As well, my left knee had been playing up again. I resorted to my physio exercises from the last time this happened, but I couldn’t do much about my two procedures. That become a matter of grinning and bearing it.
With my preparation being somewhat handicapped because of
these things, I did something that is not recommended, and which probably did
have a negative effect upon my results. Five days before the event, I ran 22k
and walked another 6k; the following day it was a 1.5k walk and a 9k run; and
then on the Wednesday, I ran 9k. The next two days were just walking. The challenge
I face is that I am part of Run the World, and I need around 10k per day to
maintain my estimated finish time. So, it all became a matter of juggling what
I need to do.
We were late leaving home for our event, and we arrived at
Boat Harbour just in time for the briefing, which I missed because of last
minute preparations with changing into trail shoes and joining the long line
for the toilets. The great news is, our youngest son was running with me in his
first trail run, having been a teammate last year in the Bruny Island Ultra
relay event. But I was far too slow for him, and we ran our own race.
The 25k event was crowded and it wasn’t easy to get a good
position on Boat Harbour Beach. As usual, I started near the rear of the field,
but I was high up on the loose sand rather than lower down where the sand was
firmer. It wasn’t easy jostling for position along the beach—and even more
difficult when we had to clamber over rocks, some of which were a bit slimy. We
are always warned about the need to take care on these rocks so that we don’t
have an accident. Participants were moving all over the place on the rocks and
I had to grab hold of one lady’s shoulder, when she had veered in front of me,
so we both didn’t come to grief. We offered each other an apology and kept on.
I’m amazed that my ability to run on these rocks belies my age as I seemed to
find it easier than so many of the other participants (I hope that this is not a
case of famous last words for the next time I run this course).
Then it was up, up, and even more up as we climbed rough
tracks and half roads. I was carrying with me, in the hope that I might be able
to better my time from 2018, details of my splits so I could make comparisons
and see how I was going. By the time I had completed 5k I was already more than
2:30 behind what I had hoped might be my time. But for the next 7k I was able
to record faster splits, even up the Hill of Death! It was interesting
observing how we each handled different sections—at least for those
participants who were around me. I would drop back on the inclines only to find
myself passing them on the declines. One early decline had me concerned. It was
steep and I found myself running downhill way too fast for my liking. It was so
hard trying to hold myself back and my eyes started to get a bit blurry from
the effort and jarring. By the time this happened for the second time my knees
were feeling the strain, even though I had taped them. And, at the bottom of
some of these declines, the track took a sharp turn. At times, there was a big
drop awaiting if I couldn’t slow myself down.
The views are always great, and I occasionally stopped for
photos. It’s obvious that I wasn’t too worried about my overall time as I was
happy with my progress at this point. I also stopped numbers of times to
enquire as to how some other participants were going when they had to stop to
stretch or take a break. Then there was helping a young lady over a stile—a
stile that I found hard to get myself up onto as my legs had begun to weary
later in the event.
It's always amazing how local farmers and their families are
out beside the course to cheer people on and, in some cases, to provide drinks
and nibbles for participants. At the top of one road a young boy and an even
younger girl gave me a high five. And how generous are the landholders who
allow us to run on their properties. What disappointed me, however, was the
number of pieces of rubbish that had been abandoned on their properties—an
empty water bottle, gel and bar wrappers carelessly discarded. At aid stations I
had three cups of water, one of coke and a couple of chocolate Cadbury Freddo
frogs as sustenance. At the same time, I continued to sip on my water as I felt
I needed it. It wasn’t until around the 22k mark that I had my first gel. That
was partly because I thought that I had nowhere to keep the wrapper and partly
because I felt that I didn’t need it. This meant that I hadn’t learnt my
lessons from previous events.
The course travelled along a beach, sealed and gravel roads,
rough tracks that were discernible because of the amount of foot traffic that
had worn a path—all the while following the pink trail markers. There were
stones and rocks to navigate, roots that were designed to trip the unwary, fine
loose dirt that would become a dust cloud at every footfall, and stubble. There
were also puddles to get around, a few mud patches to avoid and paddocks with both
plenty of cow pats and hoof marks that could turn the ankle if you were unwary.
Entering one property, I found myself stepping over a shiny snakeskin—at some point
it had been there. We were so fortunate that a lot of the event took place
under cloud cover, which made such a difference to the conditions.
The first point at which I really struggled was the
zigzagging steep and rough track not long after I had conquered the Hill of
Death. It took me 3:31 more than in 2018 to get myself up it as it twisted and
turned its way around and between trees. From that point on, I was mainly
slower than 6 years ago. Even though I was slowing in those latter stages, I
was still able to manage a sprint finish on the boardwalk and was just pipped
by the faster finishing young lady whom I had helped over the stile.
Once I reached the Inglis River Track I basically hit the
wall and the remainder of the run became a hard struggle, as I found myself
slowing quite a bit. My feet must have swollen as my toes were beginning to get
cramped in my shoes. So many people sailed by as they had judged their run far
better than I had. What I should have done in the lead up was to begin my taper
much earlier and, during the event, to use my gels more often than I did today.
I have really been wanting to run the 101k, but today proved
that I am not up to it—at least not up to it yet. I found that today’s 25k—at least
in the final stages—was far harder than my 50k run in 2019 with a couple of cracked
ribs. Despite these “disappointments”, it was a very enjoyable day! And I
managed a somewhat respectable 8th position in the male 60 and over
age category out of 24. If only they had a 70 and over age category!
