Training

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Woodbridge Riverside parkrun +

Date: 15 June
Distance: 5k
Time: 00:31.25

Traveling by air is a waiting game. Just sitting around and waiting … waiting for flights, waiting to board, waiting to take off, waiting for food, waiting to get an innings in the toilet, waiting to land, wait, wait, wait, is exhausting at best.

I am less and less keen on the thought of crossing borders, simply because border control is a real pain in the arse (plus I am a bit of a nervous flyer). The whole ordeal is stressful. But to see other places around the world and experience other cultures and environments means you have to suck it up. Alas, it doesn’t get any easier. On the contrary. But I do love traveling around, or touring, by foot or car or even train. Walking from place to place for months on end would be my first choice.

While in Perth for the Aussie science communicators conference where Gerry will be giving a talk, we decided to do some events and see a bit more of the parks in and around Perth on foot. The one event would be a parkrun the morning after we arrived (sounded easy enough), and the other the Transcend 40km walk on 22 June, all going to plan.

But often things don’t work out as planned. There will inevitably be hiccups. For instance, the second flight from Melbourne to Perth was delayed. No surprises there. What was already a very long day, starting shortly after 6am in NZ, and ended at 11:30pm in Perth (3:30am NZ time), was also somewhat eventful. Arriving later than planned in Perth, we discovered that the car rental company who delivers cars to the airport, doesn’t deliver after hours. Should have read the small print. We took an Uber to the car rental, and were dropped of in the dark at night to a deserted industrial area. I was suspicious of everything that moved and didn’t move. They were meant to send us details for after hours pickup, but somehow that email slipped through the cracks. After about twenty minutes of cussing and cursing in the dark in the middle of nowhere, Gerry searched his emails again, and luckily found the email containing the details about the lock box that held the car key. Crisis averted. And thank goodness for roaming. What did we do in the days before smartphones.

Arriving at our Airbnb accommodation after 10pm, where we had a room in a house shared with others, it turned out one of the other residents took our key from the, yet again, lock box outside the house that is used for self check-in. Again, cussing outside, we had no telephone number to contact the host, or anyone inside the house. The house looked dark and we thought that everyone was asleep and didn’t want to make a racket, but Gerry knocked anyway. Eventually one of the occupants, the lady who took our key, opened the door and handed us the key. It would appear she had some or other safety concern – I battled to understand what she was on about. Had we arrived even later, we might not have been able to get inside. But everything worked out in the end. A miss is as good as a mile, as my mum always told us.

And here’s a funny thing; when you fly from NZ to somewhere in Australia, via Melbourne, your luggage cannot be checked through from A to B. Melbourne airport rules dictate that you have to collect your luggage, go through customs, and check it in again for the local flight. Maybe it is the same for any international to local transfer. But for some reason NZ doesn’t know this. It is the second time this happened to us (I forgot we had been in this situation before). We very nearly went for coffee at the nearest cafe, thinking our luggage is checked through to Perth, while all along it was going round and round on the conveyer. Should I be telling anyone at NZ airports that this is the case?

And to top things off, Qantas must have left our luggage outside in the rain in Wellington, as when we opened the suitcases, everything was wet. So excuse me for having a wet panty about air travel and customs.

Exhausted, but finally in bed, we had a surprisingly good sleep. Short, but good.

Perth has a lot of parkruns (19 if I’m correct), and we had five to choose from all within an 11km radius from where we stayed. This one, following the John George Trail, looked the best from the online photos, so we made uncommitted plans to do it. Bearing in mind jetlag, super late to bed, and no food whatsoever with us, apart from a few bags of rooibos (red bush) tea, which made it through customs. And incase you think I’m a rooibos tea fanatic for bringing no other edibles than rooibos on this trip, it was by accident that I had it. Everything happened last minute (due to a hectic schedule, coupled with an inability to make decisions), when I grabbed the small back pack I use for work as my hand luggage bag, which happened to contain some rooibos tea bags in a small ziplock.

When we woke up at 6:30am I somehow didn’t feel too knackered, so we had tea, got dressed and went to the parkrun. The sun was out, no wind, and only slightly cool. But a t-shirt and vest was enough for me, while most of the other runners were in shorts and t-shirts only.

The welcomes and announcements were made (poking fun at the kiwis for being a bit slow? As an expat I’ve never been able to fully understand the banter between Australia and New Zealand) and we were set off. The course is sealed and in a lollipop out-and-back shape; about 2km out, a 1km loop, and 2km back on the same path.

I was hoping to make 30 minutes, so was going out at a pace just shy of 6min/km. Quicker than I have run in about a year. I can honestly not remember when was the last time I could manage a 6min/km pace. I was obviously running too fast, I knew that, let alone continuously for 5km. My muscles felt tight – like they might tighten up and not release again, sending me flying. For the first two kilometres, I lifted my feet extra high and concentrated extra hard to make my legs work. It did cross my mind for a fleeting moment that a longtime family ailment (unidentified and undiagnosed) had finally caught up with me. Both my sister and brother have this thing where their muscles would completely freeze whenever they try to do something repetitive quickly. Neither of them can run, or swim, or do any sport. By the second step they try to take, their muscles would just contract and not release, rendering them incapable to move. At a normal walking pace, they are fine. We’ve collectively self-diagnosed it as a form of the fainting goat syndrome (myotonia congenital), for lack of knowing what it is. We’ve jokingly said that my mother wrapped then up too tightly as babies. And by the time I came along, she was more relaxed about the newborn.

I managed 2 kilometres at a sub-6 minute pace, but then the wheels came of slightly. I covered the next two kilometres at just over a six minute pace, still on track for a 30 minute finish at a push, but in the last kilometre I was brought to a halt and had to walk for a bit.

I contemplated my situation. The last food I had was shortly after lift off from Melbourne, some 15 hours ago (felt like days ago), which likely had something to do with it. Coupled with jetlag, I just couldn’t make myself go faster.

But the scenery helped. The park is beautiful; the track next to the Swan River, with eucalyptus, oak, wattle trees with patches of green open spots. All along the run we were accompanied by the sound of moaning ravins and chatty green cockatoos. After a short slow walk, I could jog again to the finish, but obviously missed the 30 minute goal.

It was the 402nd running of the event, with 224 participants. There’s a cafe (which supply all the volunteers with free coffee), playground and more. It’s is a gorgeous parkrun. The locals must be thrilled to have it in such a beautiful place.

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Wellington marathon on a good day

Date: 25 June 2023
Distance: 42.2km
Time: 5:18

They say that nothing beats Wellington on a good day. And we had just that – perfect weather for our marathon. Which really is a rare thing for NZ, let alone Wellington.

I have always said that I don’t want to attempt a marathon if I can’t at least finish it in under five hours. That is the time you need to qualify for things like Two Oceans (56km) and the Comrades (89km) marathons. But sometimes you just have to let go of these preconceived ideas and bite the bullet. 

We’ve entered for a 100 miler, which takes place at the beginning of December. While our training was going quite well for the first four months of the year, reaching 271km for the month of April, things went a bit pear-shaped the following two months. School and work commitments, in combination with crappy autumn and winter weather just compounded into not much running apart from two longish runs: the Summerhill Skedaddle in mid-May, which is the only one specific to what we need to be doing, and a 30k on the flat in Palmy. And that is the biggest problem – we do all our runs on reasonably flat, and often paved, terrain. Not at all what we should be doing, but I figured it will be okay for base-building.

While things got out of hand a little, especially during June (we only managed four short runs the last two weeks before this event), the marathon date creeped up on us and before we knew it we were making the trip down to Wellington. With a thermos with coffee, snacks, and sustenance for the run, we were on our way. Nina went with, and we picked her up by about 4:30am, some 45 minutes drive from our place. We’ve had quite a few 3am and 4am starts lately with work, so another one was not going to break the camel’s back.

We arrived bright and early, in time to quickly have breakfast, sign in, go back to the car, make loo stops, and drop off a bag with dry clothes at the finish to save us another trip to the car after the run. It was still dark outside. Gerry tried to take photos, but it was too dark despite the stadium lights around the start/finish area. (And thereafter something funky must have happened with the camera as almost all of the photos ended up blurry.) Just as the gun went at 7:15 (all marathoners started at the same time this year – walkers and runners), the sky started to turn deep blue. On our way out of the stadium and down the main road running by the light of the street lamps, the sky started to turn. It was a glorious morning with no wind, and a sea that was as calm as a lake. 

Unfortunately, the course had to be changed in the last couple of weeks due to a fire which included asbestos, making it unsafe to run through that area. So instead of running about 10.5km out, followed by a roughly 5km out-and-back-and-out-and-back at the far end of the course (to make up about 21km), before coming back the same 10.5km, the course was now a double lap of the 21km course (more or less – we went a bit further on the first lap, so that we could turn for the second lap before reaching the stadium). 

Since we were not really in a place to run a marathon (but it had to happen) we had to come up with a plan to cover the 42.2km without completely breaking ourselves. So we opted for a 500 metre walk followed by a 1.5km jog strategy for every two kilometres the whole way. We followed a similar strategy (800m walk + 1.2km jog) for the Trail Trilogy and managed to finish the 100km in 15:50. For this event it means we had 20 walk breaks totalling roughly 10km of the course.

As we were running out on the first lap I could not get my head around the fact that we had to do all of that again. The further we went, the less convinced I was that I’d make another lap. Luckily the weather could not have been better which made a massive difference to our spirits.  

What felt like forever, finally saw us at the first and furtherest turn-around point (at about 11.5km). I was surprised that they didn’t hand out something to indicate that you did all the out-and-back stretches, like they did previously(there was a timing mat on the 21.1km turnaround, but not this turn which was about a kilometre further down the road). Shortly after the start we ran with someone who mentioned that runners have taken shortcuts in previous years due to not begin checked. Not that I care – if someone does that, they are only cheating themselves. But of course this becomes a real issue for category winners and placers. Why someone would do that is beyond me.

With the course being an out and back (twice), we saw some familiar faces which was great. On the stretch near the airport on our way back, the frontrunners of the half marathon (which was a championship race this year) started coming from the front, and it wasn’t too long before they caught up with us again. The last 7km, and especially the last 5km, back to the stadium on the first loop ended up being a bit chaotic with marathon runners, 21.1km runners and 10km runners all going out and back on the same road. For someone trying to run a decent time, a PB, place or win, it must have been challenging. 

Back at the waterfront there was also a market and many other people out and about to negotiate. We saw an elderly gentleman turning around from a food cart (that was oddly placed on the side dedicated to the runners) and walk straight in front of one of the speedsters. I’m sure there must have been plenty of incidents, some pushing and surely some shoving.

Eventually we reached the 21km mark on Gerry’s watch, but the turn-around point was still nowhere to be seen. Eventually, not far from the ramp going back up the stadium parking area to the finish, we reached the turnaround for our second lap. I was already sore and having to go out a second time was tough, especially with the finish line less than a kilometre away.

We trotted on with our jog-walk strategy and the kilometres ticked by slowly but surely. I reminded myself that ‘this too shall pass’. Although we weren’t too far from the back, we started reeling in other runners and walkers. Of course some walkers were way faster that us, but we kept at a steady pace for the most part, averaging just over a 7min/km pace, which surprised me considering we were walking half a kilometre out of every two kilometres.

After 30km, the wheels started coming off for me a bit. Everything hurt, my legs felt numb, an IT band started to bother, it felt like the sciatic nerve was pinching in my right leg, and my feet were killing me. I reminded myself to cut back on the cookies and chocolates, and lose some weight. Surely that should help ease the pressure on my feet?

Admittedly the finish couldn’t come quick enough. I haven’t been as sore in a very long time. We managed to do the first half in about 2:30, and the second half in 2:40, moving time on Strava. So this excludes pee and water stops. It was a tough run, but I’m glad we went. Of course doubts about doing an ultra, let alone a 100 miles, started creeping in. Before our two months slack, we still planned on doing the WUU2K three weeks after the marathon, but I realised that will not happen. Unfortunately, that makes qualifying for the miler a bit tricky. We still need to fit in an ultra to qualify and there’s absolutely nothing on the North Island running calendar for July/August, apart from WUU2K. Damn those North Range Trio organisers for not running that event anymore! At least we have until the end of October to qualify, but I don’t want to leave it until last minute.

It’s been nine years since we last did the Wellington marathon, and things have changed. Did we get a goody pack previously? Nothing this time. Also no towels at the finish line, which was also a wonderful treat the previous time around. But still aid stations along the route with electrolyte and water, as well as bananas at the finish. And a lot of marshals and cheerers along the way.

We opted not to stay for prize-giving, but rather make the trip back home. After changing into some dry clothes, I shuffled down the ramp to the car, thinking how sore I would be after sitting in the car for two and a half hours. At least we had coffee and some frooze balls for the drive back. After dropping off NIna, it was just the final stretch back home, where a lovely warm shower and a cold bubbly awaited. 

I am super grateful the weather was fantastic. Had it been windy, super cold, and sideways sleet or rain, it would have been a challenge of note. 

Time to rethink our strategy for the next five months.

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Potential upcoming events include:

  • Halcombe 30k solo
  • Tekapo 50k
  • Blue Lake 24-hour
  • Crater Rim 83k
  • Cape Kidnappers 32k
  • Taniwha 44k
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Cystic fibrosis #27MoreYears fun run

Date: 2 April
Distance: 20km
Time: 2:14

After parkrun in Palmy, followed by a three kilometre walk, we headed home to shower, pack and get ourselves sorted for the remainder of the weekend.

First up was the Kimbolton Sculpture Festival. I was hopeful to be able to create something in time to participate in the exhibition, but alas. Time caught up with me and I couldn’t get it done in time. Better luck next year, maybe.

The festival had lots of vendors including food stalls, but the art exhibition seemed smaller? Maybe just my imagination. While having lunch there (the food truck selling gluten free meals was a good find) it started to drizzle. We didn’t stay long and as we were leaving I poured some coffee from our thermos for the road.

From Kimbolton to New Plymouth is a little over three hours drive. It was already past 2pm when we left, but thought we could still head to the event base when we get to New Plymouth and maybe preregister. This was not to be.

As we were driving the drizzle became more persistent, and by the time we reached Stratford it was raining bucket loads.  At times it was difficult to see the car in front of us, and we had to slow down considerably. The deluge made traveling slow and arduous.

Originally, when Gerry first read of the event, we thought we’d go visit friends and do the event at the same time. But the timing didn’t work out, as they were heading down south the same morning to bike the West Coast Wilderness Trail. They offered their house to us to stay in and left the key with a friend.

At around 6pm we were safety inside the house, dry and sheltered from the rain. We poured the last glass of leftover wine and dished up a precooked meal and salad.

Luckily it was the end of daylight saving (something I am not a fan of), and we had an extra hour before having to get up early for the 8am start.

A persistent drizzle through the night had me worried that we were in for a wet run. According to the weather predictions it was meant to still rain until after 9am, meaning we would run at least the first hour in the rain. When we woke up it was pouring again. Cats and dogs. All we could do was cling to the hope that it would pass soon.

We arrived (not so) bright and early at the event base at Hickford Park in Bell Block shortly after 7am. With an inaugural event you never know how popular it will be and how many runners and walkers will pitch up. Turned out we were the first late entrants and not many to follow. Our ‘bib’ numbers (written on our hands with a permanent marker) were 52 and 53, of which 18 participants were doing the 20km run (the others were entered in the 5km and 3km events). And I thought to myself, here we go again – an out and back next to the sea and only about 20 participants. Same as the Foxton Beach Footprints in the Sand event. Only this one ran along the Taranaki Coastal Walkway, so the path was sealed all the way, as opposed to running on the sand. Theoretically the sealed path should result in a faster time.

While we were waiting around it started to drizzle very lightly. I donned my rain jacket and we walked to the loo which was a few hundred metres away. With ample time to kill we ended up making a second trip to the loo.

The drizzle cleared up, the weather was looking better, it wasn’t too cold, and we decided to leave our rain jackets in the car. We started at the back, but soon passed two runners, and a few kilometres later another. We stayed in this position for the bulk of the run, until we passed another in the last kilometre. The walkway was as busy as always, with bikes, prams, toddlers, scooters, e-bikes, walkers, dogs, as presumably with the improved weather, every man and his dog were out enjoying the outdoors before winter truly sets in.

What I completely forgot about is how undulating the path is. We’ve run and biked it a few times before, but I still anticipated a flatter run. Fickle memory – only remembering the good parts.

I was going okay in the first half. The wind was mostly a side-front wind (meaning the return would be a tail wind), with dark clouds still looming, but no rain. Although it was cool when we started I was soon hot and had to take off my polyprop vest. By about 5-6km, a mist spray made us a wee bit wet, but almost not worth mentioning. We crossed the railway line twice, and in the last kilometre we had the biggest ‘hill’ of all – the path made quite a steep incline to go up and over a big cliff, and repeat on the way back. At Port Taranaki we reached the third and last water spot and turnaround point. They also had bananas which I briefly considered, but they weren’t cut up, and a whole banana is a bit much. We had a bag of jelly jet-planes, so were all good anyway.

After we crested the cliff for the second time on the way back, I started to battle a bit. I suddenly felt short of breath and generally more tired than normal. Plus, I needed to pee, badly. When we reached the Te Henui Walkway and stream again shortly after the Wind Wand, I had to dash for the loo. From there it is about 7km to the finish. During this time, I also saw three 20km walkers, who started 10 minutes after us, coming from the front.

Not used to running continuously for so long, it took some doing to keep going. My pace had slowed down a bit, and all I could think about was to pass each landmark on the way: Todd Energy Aquatic Centre, Honeyfield Fountain, the Light of Land sculpture by Howard Tuffery (the curvy chrome sculpture on the pics), the Wind Wand, the intersection with Te Henui Walkway, with playground and skate park, East End Surf Club, Fitzroy Beach Holiday Park, Waiwakaiho River Mouth, Lake Rotomanu, Te Rewa Rewa Bridge (currently party under construction), and finally the Taranaki Velodrome and Hickford Park back at the finish. A few coffee shops are dotted along the the track (very tempting), as well as other sculptures.

We finished in 13th and 14th place. The weather turned out good – no rain, not too strong wind, and reasonably warm in the end.

Prize giving was only at 1:30pm, so we went home to shower, collect all our stuff, and drop off the key before heading back to arrive more than an hour early. A BMX race was happening next to our event, so we strolled over to watch some of it. It was also a good opportunity to buy some chips there, as the cart at the running event had packed up already.

We both got a spot prize (I think everyone did), which made the stay worthwhile. It is a good new event on the calendar, organised by two people involved with Cystic Fibrosis NZ’s Taranaki branch, with help from volunteers. Organising events is hard work, and it would be a shame if it didn’t become an annual institution.

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The UTK (Ultra Trail Kosciuszko) that wasn’t

I thought perhaps I should just write a follow-up about our plan to run the 100 mile event in 2022.

Maybe because it is a new event and to entice participants into entering super early (it worked!), the event had the option to carry over your entry at no cost to the next year should you not be able to do it for whatever reason. And back doors are dangerous – when there’s a back door, one is almost guaranteed to take it.

In our defence we did try. We started with a bang and were doing very well for a few months, slowly building up fitness. Then my mum got sick, and we had to make the trip back to the motherland. Travelling around the world, and back and forth between our families for more than a month, took its toll. What was meant to be a crucial time in our buildup, ended up being a next to no training month. Coupled with all the stress of travelling, missing a connecting flight due to a stuff up by Qantas with the first flight, and having to postpone everything by a week, rearrange and rebook everything, eventually arriving without luggage, the stress of a sick parent, and the list goes on, training was the absolute last thing on my mind. Plus, that back door was wide open.

Arriving back, exhausted, to horrible weather (it seems to be getting worse) – non-stop wind and sideways rain – our enthusiasm for the inaugural event was all but gone. So we made the call to transfer our entries to this year. It is not a good decision to have to make. One’s self-esteem takes a knock and you feel like a failure.

Following the proceedings leading up to the event on FB, I was met with a mix of FOMO and relief. It was snowing up in the mountain in the weeks leading up to, and still a few days out from, the event and it started to look like the compulsory gear would have to be next level. Some lack of communication and other hick-ups by the organisers – GPX files were not made available and final course maps were not shared until the last minute, perhaps because the course had to be changed TWICE due to snow and safety of runners, details about aid stations, drop bags, pacers, support crew, etc – resulted in participants getting anxious and angry. Tonnes of entries were sold off and transferred, and things were looking to be in a bit of a shambles. At the same time, those who stuck to it could boast to be hardcore, have grit, and able to deal with whatever life throws at them. Ultimately, I suspect the course routes need some serious rethinking and replanning for the years to come.

But, fingers crossed, we can get our act together and line up at the start end of this year. We bought a new watch. The Suunto 9 Peak Pro to replace the old one of more than eight years. It was time. And with new gear comes renewed enthusiasm. We have a rough idea of what we need to do, and where we need to be with our training each month. The overall aim is to get out the door six days a week, to build up slowly, never to skip the long-run, walk heaps, and do the occasional speed session. On top of that, we have to start focusing on strength training and flexibility. My buggered hips and misalignment need all the help they can get.

To 2023! May it be a good year for health and fitness.

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The intrepid trapper: Week 21

After 21 weeks of exploring and seeing, up close, a part of the country I never would have otherwise, my adventures came to an end at the Southern Ruahine Kiwi Habitat Restoration Project.

Life is a funny old thing, and the only certain thing is that everything is uncertain. It is nonetheless sad for me and a very difficult decision to have made to leave. Due to a number of reasons – none of which had anything to do with working outside, in sometimes challenging weather, cleaning rotten critters out of traps, and often being knee deep in mud or cow poo – I made the call to move on.

We went for a run on the beach on a beautiful sunny day which was good, and topped it off by scoffing down some fish & chips which was perhaps not the healthiest but very good. You win some, you lose some.

Ultreia et suseia