Six Foot Race Report

Yesterday Total: 45k
Week Total: 56k
Month Total: 96k
Year Total: 503k

I will start by saying I had an absolute ball out there yesterday - true it was a bit more interesting in parts than other years - but hey that's what makes for the good stories when we are old and grey - or - well - now for that matter :-)

The last few days of prep went well - there was still a bit of cheek coming from the right of the Evil Twins but apart from that it was all good.

Headed up the mountains after lunch on Friday and caught up with some of the usual suspects at the Edge then had a nice evening in company with Lulu, Wine Trail Runner, Jen_Runs, Owl, Sparkie, GoGirl, Don Juan and a special guest appearance by Cirque down from Briz-Vegas.

Running over my race plan before turning the light out I was quietly confident of PB'ing - true I had a low k Feb due to a virus but it was all at the "right" time - I had plenty of good trail runs in the legs and I'd built back to a 50k week last week. If I finished each split in my maximum allowable time I would go 5.52.

My plan was:

Nellies Glen Rd - 20mins
Megalong Rd - 57mins
Coxs - 1.45
Pluvio - 3.30
Deviation - 4.37
Finish - 5.52

I started in the back 3rd of wave 2 as planned but found myself overtaking lots of people on the first part - to be honest I thought wave 2 people would get away a bit quicker - I guess I'm just really confident on the steep downs.....

The trip down the stairs was exceedingly slow but I'd allowed 20mins in the plan so I just kept relaxed and swapping lame jokes with SuperFlake who was two back. We hit Nellies Glen Road in 20.30 - not too bad. My race plan was to run at better than 6.15 pace to Megalong Road and over the first (steeper) part I was very comfortable sitting on 5.45 so I just went with it knowing I'd easily slow up a bit when it flattened out around 4k.

Most of my wave were either pulling away or hooting past - fine good for them but I have a plan - and I did find a friend - Rob a tri-guy who had similar thoughts to me and we nattered on for the next couple of k's.

At about 5k maybe a bit after (?) we hit the first aid station and I had my first interesting experience - as I reached for a drink my right calf (Evil Twin No1) tore (? - read - popped, twanged, bloody hurt a lot) - I had to stop. Rob - as runners do (and even the odd tri-guy) -offered to stay and help but I shooed him on his way (thanks mate).

After a bit of a rub and stretch I couldn't run but I could hobble and then I did get back into a kind of lop-sided jog - but at this point to be honest, I thought it was hopeless and I came very, very close to stopping, turning around and limping back to the aid station and surrendering my chip. So close in fact that I actually did stop again and turn around... I looked back at the aid station a hundred meters back - deep breath time.

"Come on 2P - you can manage this - just look after yourself and you can run this out - a finish is a finish, is a finish" - I could see possibilities where seconds before there were none - I just wasn't ready to pull the pin quite yet - besides Megalong Road was less than 3k away, I could snatch it there if I needed to.

As I crossed the stiles into the cow paddock Sarge & Dazza K passed me giving me an A grade sledging which I returned in kind. This little interlude serving to get my spirit back on track. I did have a couple of nasty moments between there and Megalong Road but each time I managed to reign it in - "a finish is a finish, is a finish" plan 49c - sub 7 hours was firmly in play.

I went through Megalong Road in the high 57's - not bad - actually pretty close to plan - thank goodness I'd built a bit of a buffer early on - though when I saw all the spectators that little voice was whispering "DNF - it's easy no one will care - you've got nothing to prove" - "ahh bugger-off ya bastard - I care - go on - piss orf and leave me to it" came the louder reply and I kept jogaling. Note to self - I really must see about these voices in my head :-)

I ran with a limp down through the farms and when I hit the first hill I discovered I really couldn't power-walk so I just doddled my way up towards Pinnacle Hill - Garmy was telling me I was falling way behind my scheduled 6.30 av pace for this split but I wasn't panicking - I always thought I would fall behind the average required here.

Walking the climb must have stretched things out a bit because once I started to run again on the technical trail down towards Coxs I found that if I turned my right foot in a bit (pigeon toed) I could run without a limp - and from that point on though I could still feel a "pressure" there, but except for a few stabs and twinges it would remain just a dull ache for the remainder of the day - phew - crisis averted - I knew I could finish. From here on in I would take two cups of water at each aid station - one for me and one to pour over my calf.

I had a dream run down to the Coxs and I thought the running gods were paying me back for mistaking me for someone else they meant to punish - no conga lines at all and there were times I wondered if it was actually race day. It was also extremely pleasing to see the average time steadily falling on Garmy - maybe I can PB after all?

Through the river making sure to showboat for the photographer I was over the timing mats in 1.44.01 a bit ahead of schedule - things were definitely looking up - so time to sort myself out for the next bit.

I went a bit hard at first on the climb to Mini Mini and the twin reminded me in its own sweet way that this was not such a hot idea - so I slowed down a bit and was as upbeat and as encouraging as I could be to the steady stream of wave 3 and smattering of wave 4 runners who started to pass me by.

"That PB is starting to look dodgy again 2P - ne'r mind it is what it is - just keep going and we will see what we will see".

Up past the cattle yards (18.6k) and I was back to running - keen to make up some time on the short descent. I grabbed a water on the run and hit the steep down to the dip, the track was particularly corrugated here - I'm talking little canyons (wash-aways) in the road maybe 6 to 8 inches deep and maybe a foot wide at the top, running parallel lengthways down the road - I dunno what happened (no excuses) but it was slip, recover, slide, recover, slip, "oh faaaark" I speared in face first on one of the steepest parts of the whole track.

I saved my good looks :-) - but only at the expense of shredding both palms. My left shoulder, thigh and shin also copped a good grating as well. A veritable bevvy of runners helped me to my feet but I was keen to be on my way - luckily one of them spotted Garmy on the ground as I hadn't noticed he'd popped his pin. Muttering "thanks" and "I'm ok" to all and sundry I just tucked Garmy into my fuel belt (after checking the timer was still running of course) and kept going.

Criminitely - there was blood and dirt everywhere - I was mildly alarmed till I rationalised that a little blood mixed with sweat goes a long way and it probably looked a lot worse than it actually was. Unfortunately there was only a muddy puddle at the bottom of the dip so I'd have to wait till I got to Allum Ck in another 4k to clean up.

I wasn't too phased by my leg or shoulder (though the shoulder in particular stung a bit) but the steady dripping of blood out of my left palm was a tad disconcerting - that was my blood and I needed every single drop of it today! I was also conscious of the chunks of gravel embedded in me - I wasn't comfortable with them being there - they clearly didn't belong and I wanted them out - "Suck it up 2P - no choice - you will just have to wait".

Trudging up the last bit to Mini Mini someone ahead called out a snake warning and sure enough there was a big fat red-bellied black snake. "Christ on a bike - bad luck comes in threes - if this bastard bites me then I'm definitely re-targeting for 7 hours". This little bit of "humour" (you had to be there) was pivotal - I had a good laugh to myself and cracked out a few lame snake jokes to whoever was close enough to hear and got on with it. I also worked out that the pin was still in the band of Garmy (I hadn't noticed it before) and I fixed it on the walk - things were definitely on the up.

Over Mini Mini and running down to Allum Creek I chatised myself because I was being cautious - after all your skills don't go just because you have one fall and I got cracking again - down went the average time on garmy.... hmmmm PB or sub six?

I went through the first creek and kept the pace up to the aid station - the kind firies tried to divert me to the first aid station - but I got them distracted by telling them that I needed to save the blood and dirt for the photographs later. As I looked up I saw a girl sitting there who looked JUST LIKE GoGirl (uncanny) and I thought what a pity her race was done - turns out it WAS GoGirl but i didn't know till after I finished (must get my contacts prescription checked).

When I got to the next creek crossing I went upstream a few meters and had a bit of a bath - the cold water was heaven on my calf and I figured I was killing two birds with the one stone as I stood mid-stream patiently picking out all the bits of gravel.

Feeling much brighter and a lot more centred I headed up Pluvio knowing I was giving time away (due to the calf not letting me stride out) but reconciled myself to the fact that there was nothing I could do about it till I got onto Black range "just look after yourself mate - a finish is a finish, is a finish". I went through Pluvio in a PW 3.35.02 - it had taken me 1.51 from the river - my previous worst split being 1.47 in 2005. Still that was only 5 mins off my planned time and I still had 19kms to make it up.

I popped 2 Beroccas into my bottle (my sekrit anti-cramping strategy - they have magnesium amongst a whole lot of other good things and as it would be liquid form it should "get in"), I also took a Voltaren Rapid and a No Doz and headed off - trouble was I couldn't be arsed to run - my calf just wasn't up to it yet - "ok change of plan - just walk the first km (the steepest section) and let the precious bugger recover a bit".

It was a good plan because when I did start running it was all good and I got into a routine of running the flats and down at a reasonable pace and only walking the steeper ups - looking good - but then whether it was the lack of Feb k's or that I was running pigeon toed (probably a bit of both) my right adductor threatened to cramp (it never did actually cramp but a couple of times I had to stop and give it a rub when it did the "grabby bitey" thing and from then on I walked most of the ups slower than my fitness wanted me to). The plan had been to average 7.30 pace all the way to the end but I didn't get anywhere near this heading for the Deviation and ended up going through the campground in 4.48 - "well a PB aint going to happen but I have an hour and twelve minutes to do the last 10k to go sub six hours - hmmm entirely possible".

I fanged it down all of the hills in the Deviation and dawdled the ups (particularly the cliff) - by this stage I had also learned to slow down gradually to a walk as the sudden change of pace was the most likely cause of an adductor cramp and I needed to avoid those at all costs. Approaching Caves Road I was starting to feel a bit ordinary - but the cheer squad there (including Don Juan) chirped me up no end and when I hit the trail on the other side I fanged it. I did get passed occasionally through here but the net gain was positive and for once this section didn't seem to just go on and on and on.

By the last proper aid station I had 4.4k inclusive of 2 reasonably sized hills to go in 24 and a bit minutes - this was going to get interesting. I hared off but soon was back to grafting uphill - tear down the other side - graft back up - "you beauty this is the last up" :-)

I flew the last couple of downhill k's passing quite a few people who to their credit, though they were suffering, all without exception gave me way. You can hear the finish looooong before you see it (maybe 2k out) the buzz and the announcer over the PA just gets you right in the vibe. When I hit the formed track I risked a glance at Garmy - "bugger - there is no way I can go sub 6 but what the heck keep it going anyway and at least beat last years time of 6.03.00".

I came hurtling down the stairs and turned at the bottom - my memory is a blur of faces, pom poms and high fives - I've never been so ecstatic to finish any race - I do believe I let out a loud "wooohoooo" as I charged towards the finish. This one wasn't a PB, it wasn't even sub 6 - but am I happy? - Tchu betcha - I finished :-)

Ellie gave me my medal and some other poor chappy had the unfortunate privilege of removing my blood soaked timing chip - I had a couple of drinks of sports drink and went of to search for Mrs 2P in the crowd (who I couldn't see as I ran down the finishing chute) - a quick trip to the river to chill the leggies and back to get changed.

As always it was nice swapping stories with everyone at the end and also to finally get a chance to buy Ewen his beer (debt paid).

Whilst I haven't mentioned others (for fear of missing someone out) I will mention two of my good mates. Hats off to Jen_Runs - her 6.50 finish when lots of people didn't think she had a chance was simply brilliant. And to GoGirl you have such grace - you took your DNF with such a philosophical outlook - you are both an inspiration - thankyou.

Today I'm sore as you would expect - though the leggies aren't too bad - the naughty twin is still "pulling" a bit but I can walk on the flat without a limp so there can't be too much damage. My right shin and ankle feel like someone has given them a good thwack with an iron bar (due to running pigeon toed). I'm also having the odd spot of bother holding a knife and fork due to shredded hands (but as I need to lose weight that is not a huge problem). I'm also a tad wary about lifiting my left hand above shoulder height as my whole upper arm is a bit stiff - fortunately that has a very simple fix :-) The only thing I could really live without is the open wounds on my shoulder sticking to my shirt but I guess we all have to pay a price for our fun :-)))

Will I have another go? - Yep! That PB is still well and truly in me (and then some).