It’s Been a While
Four weeks is a long time, it’s not quite a month, unless we’re talking about February, but it’s still enough time that a lot can happen.
In the last four weeks I have interviewed the World’s Best Ultra Runner, ran a 12-hour track race, went to Hawaii, got food poisoning, interviewed our new 24-hour Aussie Champion and then failed to finish my first ever race.
It’s been a pretty crazy ride, and I hate to say it but it’s time to listen to those that have some skin in the game and focus on my longevity in the sport. I’m unlikely to ever win a race or represent Australia, but what I can absolutely do is enjoy running.
It’s hard to do that when you’re busted, I’m not quite there, but the way my back gave out yesterday after just a couple of hundred metres into my fifth lap at the Gumbaby, I am not far off it if I continue down the path I’m on.
This is half the problem with social media and what its created. Everyday we see our idols pushing the limits, and we think that we can as well. When I originally set out to run three ultras in three months I didn’t think about three factors:
The travel time
Going overseas for the first time
Work
Most of these people who are online don’t have a regular job, their job is to do ridiculous runs or complete incredible feats of endurance. In reality we can admire the David Goggins and the like, but it’s ridiculous we also don’t prioritise rest and recovery, because it’s just as important.
We don’t have the same luxury of having running as a full time job and most recently I got a promotion at work which I absolutely love, but it has also seen me flip my entire schedule on it’s head in the past month.
My alarm now sets off at 4:10am, I’m normally a person that likes to enjoy the night, so going to bed early has been an absolute wrestle, but I’m getting there. If I go back to my first point the travel time, when I signed up for ‘The Archie’ I didn’t consider a five and a half hour drive all that much, I didn’t consider 2,500m of both elevation and descent all that much either. They were both a huge factor, after being roasted in 38 degree temperatures and being five and a half hours from home I didn’t have the luxury of being able to go into my normal recovery mode.
There’s no ice or proper food at the top of Mount Buller and it just meant a cold shower, try and eat my emergency ham subway sandwich and try and sleep in compression gear. I got my first of the three ultras down so I was still feeling good, but the drive home absolutely smashed me, stopping multiple times to make sure I didn’t have an accident. It was mentally fatiguing.
You already know about my 12-hour adventure, but I finished that and then that week headed off to Hawaii for my first ever overseas adventure with Cassandra. It was an incredible time, the island of O’ahu is such a beautiful place, we flew overnight, so when we arrived it was nearly 7am local time or 3am back home for those playing at home.
So it’s then an attempt to stay awake and for the next 12 hours it felt like I was a zombie, then I had the deepest sleep I’ve maybe ever had and was right to go again. The food in Hawaii was so good and I probably indulged and didn’t run as much because I was so busted from the 12-hour track race.
My advice stay the hell away from carbons on the Mondo Track.
It was almost meditative not to think about running, because I seriously suffered one of the biggest lows I had ever experienced post race. It honestly felt horrible, so a couple of days of hiking and food really got my spirits up, including an incredible trek to the Koko Crater.
The military created lookout pillbox bunkers during World War II. A railway was created on the extinct volcano and named the Koko Crater tramway, which was used to haul cargo and supplies up to the top. Today the abandoned railway is used as hiking stairs to reach the old military bunkers and ridge line, and now known as the Koko Crater Steps.
It’s a one mile round trip from the trail head to get back down but it’s 300 metres of elevation and 300 metres coming back down. It was tough and I felt at times like I really wasn’t going to make it to the top, but the spirit was high after completing the trek.
Knowing I was coming back to Australia a bit more rested and a little bit heavier, I decided to embrace my final night in Hawaii with Cassandra and have the Cheesecake Factory, we’d already been there twice and the food was awesome, this was much the same but the Chicken Parmi Sandwich gave me the worst food poisoning of my life.
Enter the next 15-16 hours which included waking up at 3am which was 12am our time thanks to daylight savings, and just not being able to hold anything down until around 4pm Australian time, following a 10-hour flight back to the land down under.
I’m not going to say it was the food poisoning alone that hurt me leading into Gumbaby, there was multiple factors, but when you have the highest stress level you’ve ever seen on your Garmin, you know it’s going to be a long way back.
Combine that with muscles getting all tight on the flight, it was going to be a challenge to get through eight laps of arguably the hardest backyarder in Australia if not the world.
I tried to get something in my legs in the next two weeks, but I just couldn’t get out of second gear. We talk about the brain a lot and I think I absolutely defeated myself before this race began, with everything going against me physically, I then finished the job by defeating myself psychologically.
The third factor was work. I had the option of calling in sick the day after getting food poisoning, but I felt like I needed to show up after 10 days off. It was physically tough, I set the alarm a little bit earlier than 4am to give me enough time, then struggled through my shift. That began 10 days straight because we were short staffed, so it meant 10 days straight of alarms before 4:15am.
It makes it hard to get back on track with recovery, but I am making no excuses in that regard, it wasn’t my job it was the work routine. It is what it is, and I tried to manage it in the best way possible, I just couldn’t, despite going to bed earlier than I ever had I couldn’t sleep, my mind would race about not completing the race, I’d then wake up and tell myself that not finishing doesn’t matter, but I didn’t know how that would feel until I’d have to wrestle with it face-to-face.
Gumbaby Race Report
It wasn’t an ideal sleep heading into the race. I’d played footy the day before notching up my 50th game for the Murrumbateman Eagles, kicking three goals which brought up 101 goals for the club, becoming the third person to reach that game milestone, and the first person to kick that many goals for the club.
A special day, but in reality I should’ve put it back a week if I wanted to complete the Gumbaby, my legs were sore and my back was giving me grief, I feel like it’s due to still having really tight legs and not doing enough yoga over the last month.
The drive out to Blue Range Hut and my mind is racing, the final four are left in the main Last One Standing event, and I wonder how long they’re going to keep going. I’d set aside a plan to have an ANZAC biscuit and a Spring Energy gel at the end of each lap, and also about 500ml of water to keep my hydration up.
The Gumbaby Race itself is eight laps of 6.7 kilometres with 180 metres of elevation each lap.
I found some comfort in having a large Elevate contingent, and felt this might be enough to push me over the line, it worked for the first couple of hundred metres, until I realised I really had nothing in my legs. I tried to convince myself I did, but I came home in the first lap in last place, but still had eight minutes to spare.
My coach Shiree was there and she’s always a calming voice, which helped me feel a little bit better, and in my mind I knew that while I was struggling physically I wasn’t yet in the danger zone.
Carrie and I ran the lap together, and she was in a meditative state, I thought if we could stick together after watching a lot of backyarder races 48-52 minutes seems to be that sweet spot, it’s enough time to get food in, but not enough time to cool down, I felt like I had it down to a science until the wheels just started going the other way.
I think it was 53 minutes the next lap, I was trying to crack jokes to distract myself enough that my mind might convince myself I’m alright, but it wasn’t working. 54 minutes on the third lap, I tried to say to myself if I go for a minute longer each time we can still sneak home.
I had a little bit of coca cola on laps two and three to see if a bit of caffeine might do the trick, but it was the next lap though was the one that hurt. I had to take a toilet break, which had me behind the eight ball. I was trying to keep up with Mellita Bingley, who runs the Stromlo Running Festival, she told me she was going to call it at the end of the lap, but we pushed in to make it with four minutes to spare.
I had my friend Kym ask me how I was going but I knew my legs were in a battle, I went straight for the communal tailwind and tried to down three bottles in the hopes I might get some zing for the next lap, but I just felt heavy.
I started the lap well to my surprise, but as soon as I reached the incline at the start of the lap my lower back went on me. It was like this tightness and numbing feeling right across the lower back, then this feeling of spasms. I’d already mentally defeated myself and now my body was coming to finish off the job.
In the backyarder you have the choice to either turn back or fight on and try and either beat the clock or time out. I chose the latter, I was in this pain, and I kept doing the sums in my head to work out the pace I required, but when I hit a nine minute downhill on a section I’d been doing in less than seven minutes the reality started to hit hard.
It’s this inevitable sinking feeling, that despite all my other Houdini efforts, today it just wasn’t going to happen for me, I watched those in front of me go further and further into the distance, in the end I was only chasing my shadow. I sat down on a patch of grass I could find, trying to stretch my back out to see if I could do three five minute splits downhill, not impossible but improbable.
I was so embarrassed that I wanted to dig a hole and hide, I’d done many 30 kilometre runs, but obviously not under these circumstances, and not with what happened in the lead up, knowing if I kept this pace up I’d be passing people coming out on their sixth lap, so I slowed down to a walk, the medic found me and checked in with me.
In that moment I just wanted to be alone, but the comfort of having someone say that I’d done 30 more kilometres than them was a nice feeling that the race hadn’t been a complete waste. I walk back to the site and take it all in good humour, but the reality is my back is cooked and my head is swirling with a thousand reasons I couldn’t complete the race.
I see my friend Binh there he’s always the voice of reason, we share some words I’ll keep between us, I’m looking forward to sharing Bondi 2 Manly with him later this year.
Most of all it just hurt. A party atmosphere, but I felt like the guy in the corner who was forced to be designated driver. If there was to be any consolation it was that I didn’t let my emotions turn it into a selfish parade. I was able to watch as Pam Muston won the Gumby, becoming I believe the first woman to do so in Australia in a LOS.
My friend Benny Grimshaw fought on bravely, but ultimately he just ran into the Goat at the top of her game.
At the same time I was trying to convince my friend Nat to go back out, more for selfish reasons that I didn’t want her to feel the same way I was feeling, but hers was different, she viewed the race as training and the DNF didn’t hurt as much because she knew she had more to give, whereas I just didn’t have anything.
I was then able to cheer home a number of my Elevate family in their last couple of laps with the first one past the post on the last lap winning the title. I was amazed to see so many do so well, I won’t name you all, you know who you are and I love you all as part of the big blue family.
In the end while I’m still disappointed 24 hours later I’ve come to the realisation that it’s not always going to be perfect, and I’ve already far exceeded what I ever thought I’d be capable in the sport, but if I want to complete my goal of one day running a miler I need to put a lot more attention to detail into a few of the little things that are letting me down at the moment.
A massive thank you to the Ultra Mediocre Runners of Canberra for putting on the event, ever since I started running at the start of the pandemic I had this race on my list and it didn’t disappoint. A shout out to Paul McCann as Gumbaby Race Director you did a cracking job, and as always John Harding thank you for taking photos and being one of the biggest advocates for trail running in the country, you’re a legend.
What I do know however is I’m coming back next year to the Gumbaby, I’ve got unfinished business.
A Man on top of his Game
I’ve been able to interview some incredible people in the first eight episodes of the Peak2Soon Podcast Powered by Alfred, and my latest interviewee is right up there as one of the best!
Joe Ward is an absolute legend, and an even better bloke. He shares so many tips and tricks and I feel that if you want to get the most out of your running you’ll really take a lot out of this chat with Joe.
Hope your back is feeling better soon. Learn to take the rough with the smooth, you can’t win them all. And remember what your body has been through in recent months. You’ve achieved so many great goals already, many more than me and you haven’t been running trails as long as me. I get jealous of what you have already achieved and wish I could do the same! But you have to check in with yourself and how your body and mind is feeling. You’ve got many more great races/events ahead of you. Some you will do great in, some not so well. Overall carry on enjoying the trails!
I swear cars Sitting down just kills me. Never had a good race after travelling local races so much better.