Training

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Woodville to Wharite Peak (and back)

Date: 1 September 2018
Distance: 28km (14km one way)
Time: 4:22 (approx)

At the start of the walk at the i-Site – just the two of us.
Not sure whether to wear a windproof jacket or a warm jacket, Gerry stopped to swop his top layers.
The sea of orange shirts up ahead.
Wharite Peak covered in a thick cloud.
Soon the orange snake were behind us, as well as ahead of us.
Young and old came out to support.
Early on the gravel road the gradient was still manageable.
Until we started to climb considerably.
The windfarm remains quite a sight from up here.
Up, up, up.
The snow-covered Mt Ruapehu in the hazy distance.
Almost there!
Finally at the trig.
Running downhill is so much easier.
Tracey in the middle, only a few hundred metres from the top.
Going down is fun, until afterwards when your quads are minced.
A narrow bridge we all had to cross on the way out of town, which was insanely busy.

We recently found out about a young Palmerston North woman by the name of Tracey, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis a couple of years ago. She received a grant from the Mastering Mountains charitable trust to walk the Inca trail to Machu Picchu, and is currently in training by Massey Sport and Exercise student Arbie Hong. In an attempt to raise money for the MS charity, as well as creating awareness about the illness, she organised the Woodville to Wharite Peak walk. Not only did she organise the walk, but also participated to see how she would manage and ended up walking the full 14km up to the peak in only 3.5 hours. With Woodville at about 92 metres above sea level and Wharite Peak at 920 metres, it is a tough uphill and no easy feat. Continue reading →

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Catchment Ultra recce

Date: 22 June 2018
Distance: 50km
Time: 9:08

There was a time in my life when I thought it was pure madness to run anything further than 27km by yourself in a training run. It already took some brain gymnastics to run anything further than a 21km and not get a medal. But to run ultras you have to also do long training runs and while training for a 5-day stage race back in 2008, we finally got our heads around 23+km training sessions – without medals! We have always tried to do our extra-long-runs (e.g. further than 27km) at events. Events to me is not necessarily a “race”, but often just a LSD training run with the added bonus of having aid stations along the way. Continue reading →

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Kohitere trig track

Date: 25 March 2018
Distance: 15.5km
Time: 2:10

A glorious early morning start.
Mist in the valleys and tree tops.
The map of the course. We went all the way to Gladstone Road and back.
The only mud on the track.
Zigzagging up the cycle path.
At last a bit of down hill.
Gerry having a ball on the downhill.
Gerry and Nina heading uphill.
Some good viewpoints: Lake Horowhenua and Levin down below.
The track is mostly in the forest, protected from wind, rain and sun.
Shortly before we reached Gladstone Road, we crossed this scenic stream.
The final bit of downhill on the 4WD track.
We started seeing more runners and walkers on the way back.

Is it not funny how one always neglects your backyard? And I’m not talking about the weeds that are now thriving where once there was a productive and prolific vege garden behind our house. I’m talking about running trails and tracks that are so close that you always save them for another day. Continue reading →

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The fifth leg – Queenstown (Tasmania)

Date: 26 February 2018
Distance: 4.2km
Time: 00:29

The fifth leg done. Heading into leg six with a smile.
If the run didn’t lift his spirits, this bright and jovial yellow house certainly did.
You don’t have to go far to reach the edge of town.
Crossing a scenic bridge en route to the cemetery.
The great train race. At least the train is a bit older than the birthday boy.
“Harry op die ou tremspoor.”
A run on a beautiful morning always leaves you feeling better than before.
A bit of shade on a bright sunny morning.

Traveling lots and staying in different places every night, meant that we couldn’t fit in as many runs as we would have liked to. You think you might run lots and stay active, and you plan for it, but somehow it is just too hard to make it happen. Especially when you travel on a shoestring, therefore limiting your motel, backpackers, cabin or other bottom of the range accommodation, by trying to camp or make use of the local free camping spots (which invariably don’t have showers, or even so much as a tap). Continue reading →

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Risdon Brook Track – Hobart (Tasmania) – unofficial parkrun and then some

Risdon Brook reservoir.
A lovely sunny day.
Heading up one of the hills.
A Tasmanian Native-hen (Gallinula mortierii).
We passed quite a few other track users.
A great outing.
Some welcome shade.
The dam wall.
Close encounters with a wallaby.

Our training took a turn for the worse the past couple of weeks, so the thought of a 101km event in 9 days time, is making me a wee bit nervous. After 19 hours of traveling, we finally touched down in Tasmania, and decided to walk the 1.7km to catch a local bus into town where we had to pick up the rental car. At $11 for the both of us, it seemed a much better option than the airport bus at $40 for us two. Besides, we needed to do some form of exercise after all that sitting. Continue reading →