Author: Wouna le Roux

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Catch-22

hip

Once, on day four of a five-day event, I was just knackered. Luckily I could pull myself together and still made the cut-off for the day. This pretty much resembles my current state of mind.

Any person doing any form of physical activity is bound to have some form of injury at some point. That’s just the laws of nature. Some people are lucky and hardly ever get injuries or niggles, while others are plagued by problems. It is what it is, and what will be, will be, to quote Allan Karlsson from the Hundred Year Old Man Who Climbed Out The Window And Disappeared, by Jonas Jonasson.

So it came about that I developed a hip niggle. I didn’t give it much thought and it was presumably just another result of my misalignment (curvy spine, fused vertebrae with sacrum, rotating pelvis, leg length discrepancy, etc). It would not be the first time I battle with a niggle and will certainly not be the last. Continue reading →

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A Buffanatic

It has to be said that I’m probably the biggest Buff fan ever since I first discovered these neck scarves. Was it 2003? Or maybe 2004? Just for those wondering where the name comes from, Buff is short for “bufunda” which means scarf in Spanish. It was developed around 1992 by Joan Rojas, a motorcyclist, who was looking for something to protect his neck from the wind and cold.

Will I ever forget the first five Buffs we bought. Five! Not one or two to try them out first. No, it had to be at least five. That probably consumed all our savings, but it just sounded (hadn’t even seen one in real life yet before ordering them) like the best invention since sliced bread. Continue reading →

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New Plymouth half marathon

Date: 2 October 2016
Distance: 21.1km
Time: 2:31.27
Previous: 2011

In sight of the finish – a good reason to smile! [Pic courtesy of NP Joggers & Walkers]
A drizzly morning to start off with.
Runners and walkers huddled up under the pavilion roof.
New Plymouth mates, Henriette and Des.
A fair amount of participants in the 21.1km event.
Lovely downhill in the first kilometre or two taking you to the lowest point on the course.
Gerry having a very relaxed morning out.
Dark clouds coming from the sea.
And event darker clouds from the mountain side.
Happy helpers at the first water point.
One of the biggies in the first half – the hill that goes straight up.
Halfway! Yay! Downhill from here, right?
Gerry catching up after the last water point.
Beautiful countryside.
Happy to find some of my favourite colour!
Glad to have made it one more time to the finish of a half marathon.

We have now officially exhausted the last bit of our running memory. No more long-runs without a bit of training first.

When friends invited us to join them for the half marathon, I thought to myself, yeah, why not. So we entered, knowing very well that I’m tempting fate (more accurately, tickling the lion’s testicles) and it’s only a matter of time before the wheels come off. As it rightfully did. Continue reading →

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Running on memory

Date: 18 September 2016
Distance: 21.1km
Time: 2:21
Previous: 2011, 2014, 2015

If you’re not having fun, you’re not doing it right. 😀 Photo by Caroline Williams.
Shortly before the start, with all the Hatuma Lime Half branded Ts.
Gerry even donned his T from last year.
The out-and-back section, before heading into the countryside.
We started off on an easy jog so before the end of the out-and-back section we were already right at the back of the pack.
An easy run, with Graeme keeping us company.
Gerry and Graeme enjoying the open road.
A glorious day to be out in the country for a run.
Water point with fruit chew toffees! What a nice treat.
The third water point, signalling the arrival of the last quarter of the race. Water points doubled as change-overs for the 4-person relay teams, so were spaced roughly 5km apart. Plus a bonus water point roughly two kilometres from the finish.

All photos by us, except where otherwise indicated.

The Hatuma Lime Half Marathon reminds me of a mini-Rotorua marathon: once you’ve done the first busy section through town (in this case, the short out-and-back stretch outside the race course), you head into the country where on a good weather day, you cannot ask for a better setting while you make your way around a lake (Lake Hatuma here). Great community support on country roads where you can just cruise along admiring the scenery, until you reach the final quarter of the event – the stretch from the airport (a small rural air strip in this instance) which takes you back through town, not as scenic and also the toughest part to the finish. Continue reading →

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A “user-friendly” test in endurance

Some quick planning the night before, over a tipple.
At the beginning … there were two clean, non-sore runners …
After a while, the sun came through …
… and rumours of severe weather warnings seemed far off the mark.
Fuelled with fries (stupid, stupid), we suffered through a very difficult third interval.
Interval 4 around Massey campus was the first of the dark runs.
When will this end??
Around 2:30am, soaking wet, we were almost finished with our sixth interval.
Interval 7. Now we may as well push through. So close.
And what a wonderful treat to be joined by Graeme (all the way from Whanganui) and June!

When Gerry first told me about the Ultra Interval Challenge, I was very excited as this sort of thing is right up my alley. It is a worldwide initiative where everybody started at the exact same time, irrespective of where you are in the world. In NZ our starting time was 10am on 23 July. The idea was to run 10km every three hours over a 24-hour period. Therefore 8x10km, totalling 80km. Our initial intention was to turn it into a wee event, by having a base camp with supplies, access to toilets, etc, and hopefully, manage to lure some friends into joining, but then we got busy with other stuff and all but forget about the challenge. Continue reading →