The Long Game
Chasing longevity after learning that not everyone gets that chance.
A song that I just love.
People sometimes sneer at those who run every day, claiming they’ll go to any length to live longer. But don’t think that’s the reason most people run. Most runners run not because they want to live longer, but because they want to live life to the fullest. If you’re going to while away the years, it’s far better to live them with clear goals and fully alive then in a fog, and I believe running helps you to do that. Exerting yourself to the fullest within your individual limits: that’s the essence of running, and a metaphor for life — and for me, for writing as whole. I believe many runners would agree.
– Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
Vale Lance Corporal Jack Fitzgibbon
As a journalist there probably isn’t a day where we don’t put our human emotions to the side, and the story about Lance Corporal Jack Fitzgibbon was one of the hardest days I’ll perhaps ever have reporting, but it’s been nothing compared to what my friend Grace and her family have been through following the death of a beloved member of their family.
I never got the chance to meet Jack, but if he’s anything like my friend Grace he would’ve been the life of the party. The 33-year-old was injured during a parachute training exercise at the RAAF base at Richmond in Sydney, with the Defence Force announcing later that he had succumbed to his injuries.
Most recently my friend Grace broke up with her long-term boyfriend and Jack was one of the first to lend a hand, or tell her that he had a bed open, as far as I’m aware, he was a larrikin who was always there when his sister’s need him.
A life taken far too soon, but a life that won’t be forgotten anytime soon.
For Women Everywhere We Can Do Better
The other story that’s been hard to put to the side has been the story of Samantha Murphy, a woman who hasn’t been seen since going missing for a run in Ballarat East.
A man has been charged with her alleged murder, I won’t name him and quite frankly the fact a recent article discussed the fact he was a bright student ‘who wanted to stop climate change’ is neither here nor there.
Because that’s not the narrative.
The narrative is that once again another woman has allegedly been murdered at the hands of a man, and instantly there is a narrative to explain the man’s perspective, this level of victim blaming is bullshit.
I run with women, a lot of women, grandmothers, mothers, daughters, sisters, cousins, and my stomach would absolutely drop if something like this happened to them.
Society tells women to not run alone at night, but Samantha ran in the morning at a time when a lot of my friends run trails. The fact that we don’t change the conversation to ‘how about we stop attacking women who are going about there day’ is breath taking to me.
I know there will be some that read this and go ‘it’s not all men’ but that’s the point, it’s a small minority of men who need to be stamped out, because it’s unacceptable that a woman dies each week in Australia due to a violent incident.
It’s not good enough that the narrative is directed at what women can and can’t do, and whether they should carry keys. Because that’s something I’ve certainly never had to do.
So the next time you’re talking about a violent incident, don’t try and humanise the alleged offender, because for the majority of us we can go about our day without murdering anyone, we can and should do better.
The Path to Australia’s Great Race
This week I decided that I want to get an Akubra, but I don’t want to buy it I want to earn it by finishing Coast to Kosci.
For a long time my end game has been UTMB or Western States, but the more I find my people in this sport, the more I realise there is nothing that would sum up my journey in this sport than going from a beach in Eden to the top of Mount Kosciuszko.
I’m aware of the challenges that come with that, and that this will take years to achieve, the first step in the building block is getting my 100 kilometre time down, from there it goes to a miler, and then the application process.
It’s something I’d like to chase over a decade, and recent conversations with some great runners made me realise that I’ve got 10-15 years before I reach their age, that could be 10-20 thousand kilometres I could run before then, it’s a lot of time.
The other lesson I’ve learned is that it’s okay to miss a training day, I feel there has been a toxic culture recently of pushing ourselves to the brink. Others not realising what it can do to you will just push and push, and like a rubber band they’ll snap.
You know what there are runners that can do that, but I take the Hanny Allston method now of dealing with stress and realising that my body doesn’t know the difference between work and physical stress. Sometimes going for a run at the end of a stressful day isn’t the way to go, and it’s seen my injuries drop significantly.
I no longer feel guilty for missing a training day, or chasing mileage on strava, or feel the pressure of reaching a certain number of kilometres. Diversifying my offering has helped me so much, doing three strength sessions, and adding cross training is what I’ve found works for me.
It’s this approach that I hope will lead me to build a solid base, and by picking two-three big races a year, I can really make that dream of chasing C2K a reality.
This is the Greatest Show
I’ve just watched one of the most incredible human performances by Camille Herron over 6-days, the list of achievements is absolutely mind-boggling:
Part of her crew was Martin Fryer, one of the best ultra runners to ever grace this Earth.
I’m blessed to have met Camille when she came to Canberra last year for the Sri Chimnoy 48-hour race. Her energy is big, you know when you meet people and they have this aura? That’s Camille.
She is Big FKN Energy. Confidence personified and breaking down new methods to run long. She doesn’t do what most would consider a long run, she does multiple runs a day, breaking her week down into 11-14 runs. It’s fascinating to see how she’s tackled a six-day event.
I didn’t like when she copped criticism at World’s for her performance, if anything it showed she’s human, and everyone has an off day. I’m so pumped for Camille and I can’t wait for her to share an insight into the breakdown and for Martin to share stories of this great adventure, what an incredible event with women of all backgrounds breaking down their own goals. Simply inspiring.
Bullen the Bully No More
I recently joined the Ultra Mediocre Runners of Canberra at the end of last year. I think Canberra has such a beautiful running scene, and I’m blessed with those that surround me, where in some groups I’ve floated through whether it be Tuesday Pub Runners, Morning at Running 4 Resilience, the couple of Hillseekers, or my beloved Elevate, I’ve met some incredible people.
But UMRoC and Elevate is where my heart lies, and there now appears to be a crossover more and more between the two - there is a number of what I call ‘dual citizens’, but the thing I love about UMRoC is that it’s not conventional, but hey it’s 2024, and when was conventional the way to do it anyway?
We wear pink, and stand out absolutely everywhere we go, but the people are what makes it what it is. It’s like one big dysfunctional family of ultra runners, but everyone gets along, and everyone is awarded their space to be them and all of who they are.
One of my faves in the club is Rachel Burns or ‘Tron’ (oh yeah everyone has a nickname and mine is Toast). Together we are this big ball of energy, and next month we’re tackling GUMBY together, a race that kept us out for long periods last year. On Sunday we tackled Bullen, I haven’t been there for 18 months, because the last time I was there it chewed me up and spat me out in the middle of my Kosci training.
But I rode the wave of energy that Tron provides, alongside my coach Shiree, my good friend Nat and the rest of the gang. I turned early than the rest of the group, knowing I just wanted to survive the brutal way back, it’s 500 metres of climbing each way, it would’ve been closer to 600 metres if I kept going.
I was proud because at the start of this year I made a commitment to myself, a quiet goal to grow as a runner because I’d been taking the piss, and despite running just a couple of hundred metres less than last time I finished 75 minutes faster, a huge confidence boost, leaving me no more demons to conquer in the Canberra region.
I don’t know when you’ll read another one of these, I feel like writing when it comes to me, like my running I’m not pushing anything, and I hope you can all appreciate that.
See you on the trails soon x
It’s a blessing to grow old. Many people don’t make it.
I love all of this Brent! <3