Xterra Beautiful Mad Muddy Makara Race 1 recap

Posted on April 26, 2013 by Run Wellington

It’s a beautiful day – Sky falls, you feel like
It’s a beautiful day – Don’t let it get away

You’re on the road – But you’ve got no destination
You’re in the mud – In the maze of her imagination

You love this town – Even if that doesn’t ring true
You’ve been all over – And it’s been all over you

It’s a beautiful day – Don’t let it get away – It’s a beautiful day

So why am I quoting a U2 song on a race recap? Well let me tell you that Xterra Race 1 was absolutely amazing! Yes regardless of the rain, the mud and the hard graft climbs it was beautiful!

This was my first Xterra Trail Race of the series. The series consists of four trail races with options of a short, medium and long course options. This is great since anyone can have a go by choosing a distance that they are comfortable in. I signed up for the Long course over the series. The first race was in quite familiar territory for me in the Makara Peak mountain bike park. A haven for mountain bikers and the occasional runners who are brave enough to venture into run the trails now and then. Essentially the total length of all tracks combined is about 50kms give or take a few! The park is only about 20mins drive from central Wellington where I live and I have ridden my Mountain Bike on some of these tracks so I was somewhat prepared for what I was in for.

Another side note that I should add before I continue on this recap is that I’d just gotten back from a week in London. I’d been inside a plane for about 20-30hrs and Saturday was mostly spent recovering! Essentially a week of what was mostly running on the flat roads of London. The last “hill” run that I had run was the Porirua Grand Traverse. In any case I wasn’t out there to “race” but run on some awesome trails with a whole bunch of others and enjoy it!

Sunday 21st April morning started pretty much with a downpour and driving to the start I knew this run was going to be pretty much a wet and muddy affair. However it wasn’t that cold since there was hardly any wind which was a bonus some might say in Wellington.

There was a long queue at registration since essentially the first race was a sell out with over 500 people taking part in across all of different event options! After picking up my registration number and timing chip and getting my gear all sorted I headed to the start of the race and met up with some of the others from the Wellington Running Meetup Group. Most were doing the short and medium course.

Xterra Wellington – with Friends from Running Meetup

The Long Course runners (which included me) was waved off after a race briefing around 9:15am from up the road from the ‘official’ start gate. This was to allow everyone to get into multiple groups for the first part which was a gradual uphill on some single track where passing wasn’t that easy. I was kind of in the ‘middle’ group averaging about 6min/7min km pace for the first part of the run. The first part is on two well maintained trails (which was soggy not muddy) named Koru and up Sally Alley. Then heading down via Missing Link to Nikau Valley with a climb up via Possum Track and then all the way up Leaping Lizard and onto Aratihi to Makara Peak (highest point at around 410m). Then it’s a downhill via Vertigo! Yup Vertigo! as the name suggest was pretty vertically downhill, it was pretty technical and classed as an “Expert” downhill track in MTB terms! And going down that on a rainy and muddy day was pretty much interesting to say the least! It was part mud skidding and sliding all the way down! And just when you thought things can’t be that bad after this, you headed UP in to Trickle Falls aka “Tricky Falls” – I have no idea how any one would ever use this as a downhill or an uphill mountain bike trail. Trickle falls is steep, rocky and goes over 1km back up to Makara Peak, pretty much I was walking and clambering up the steep rocky slopes at this stage. Some others in front of me was having difficulty and was sliding backwards for each couple of steps! It was slow going but eventually made it back up to Makara Peak with about 15kms into the race! After that climb it’s a pretty good run along Ridgeline and then onto Big Tom’s wheelie and onto Lazy Fern where it was a smooth & fast run back to the Finish! Total time without any major mishaps apart from falling back on my arse a couple of times on mud 2hrs 23! Out of the Men’s open field smack bang in the middle again!

Xterra Makara Long Course Profile Total ascent ~900m over 19.5km total distance on my Garmin

Xterra Trail Map of Makara Run

I had fun! I was completely covered in Mud! I was wet, cold but I didn’t care! I was smiling and wanted more! It was just what I needed on a Sunday! After the race I chatted with a few people and grabbed a coffee from the cart and headed back to my car.

Xterra Fun!

I’m already looking forward to the Second Xterra Race on the 12th of May! Until then I have the Rotorua Half Marathon next weekend on Saturday 4th May! I’ll update how I went in that next week!

Happy muddy trails!

Porirua Grand Traverse Mountain Run recap

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Run Wellington

The Porirua Grand Traverse is a multi discipline event consisting of Multi sport triathlon (Kayak, Mountain Bike and Run) Duathlon (Mountain Bike and Run) & solo event options. I entered the solo 18km mountain run event. The day of the event (Sunday 7th April) dawned with some ominous black clouds & a southerly forecast for most of the day. I guess Wellington region has had it’s fair share of good weather & a bit of rain wasn’t going to be a show stopper. I had picked up my race pack and number earlier and got to race start around 9:30 for a 10:15 race briefing and a approximate 10:30 start. The event organizers wanted to get the Mountain run started as soon as the first multi sporters transitioned from MTB to Run. At around 10:15 the field of about 130 runners overall for the mountain run was briefed about the course. Then we all walked about 50meters onto a side road for a countdown and we were off!

Coming into this run I was a bit nervous given my recent blow out at the Mt Lowry Challenge however I was confident that after the weekend in Tongariro I should be able to tackle this 18km run better than the Mt Lowry run.

The first km was through sealed road to the start of the trail at Rangituhi park – from there on it was all trails and a climb first up (It is a mountain run after all). The first climb was about 200m straight up through some nice trails nothing bad just going up and i got into a good pace not pushing too much, then a downhill which was pretty sweet and I managed to blast past a few people! So far so good – just at the bottom there were a few people cheering us on and also a marshal. (They had altogether about 100 marshals for this event and they did an outstanding job – I must add)

Right just after that downhill bit was ‘the climb’ and this was brutal. It was all wooden stairs all the way from about 75m to 435m over roughly about 3km distance. My legs were screaming but I kept on – no big drama but slow going, reduced to walking in some bits and a few people in turn overtook me. Once you were at the top the views across out to the coast was simply stunning! Sorry I don’t have any photos and I didn’t stop. From the top it’s a downhill for about 1kms which I ran like a mad man passing a few who overtook me on that climb. Then you had to go up this little hill and that was not fun. From that little bit it was a straight downhill back to sea level around the 10km mark.

PGT Elevation Profile

I was feeling pretty good and it was only a little bit windy. The trail follows the coast line for about another Km or so then starts to gradually go up. There was a camera man in the bushes just on that coastal bit and he got a shot of me running through.

Along the coast…

The last hill was a bit of a struggle for many a runner, and for me it wasn’t much of a struggle and I was able to keep a easy running pace up this bit to the top and then it was a downhill! Woohoo! I looked at my watch and knew I could make it close to 2hrs! So ran down the last bit as fast as my legs would allow me and passed a few people. Then onto the last bit of road and onto the finish line in 2hrs 03mins! I am pretty happy with that time in contrast to Mt Lowry finish. In the results I placed 25th out of 50 in the Open group. (talk about middle of the pack runner) 🙂

After the run there were showers available which was great and they had a BBQ setup with a free lunch to each participant. I stayed around for the prize giving and chatted with my friends from the Wellington Running Meetup Group.

Members of Wellington Running Meetup Group

All in all I loved this race and I will definitely give this one a go next year! The organizing team did a fantastic job and along with the volunteers/marshals (who were everywhere) made this a definite must do event.

PGT Run Course

Next event I have on my schedule is the Xterra Trail event on 21st of April. I’m heading to London on Friday this week and get back to NZ on Saturday 20th. So I’m not expecting a fast pace just after a long 36hr plane ride. Oh and also I am announcing another give away soon on my blog. Unlike the last give away this will be open to anyone who reads my blog (local and overseas). You’ll have to wait for the announcement and trust me it’s a goodie!

Marathon training update weeks 2 to 5

Posted on April 6, 2013 by Run Wellington

I posted about my first week update on the 16 week Marathon training plan that I am currently following a few weeks back! Now I’m well into the program and is at end of week 5. The 16 week Marathon plan has undergone some significant changes since I first published it – the updated version can be found here. This has been due to some valuable feedback from experienced Marathoners and also because of a few *new* events that I have signed up for. First I’ll talk about how the last 4 weeks had gone and then outline the updated plan.

Key highlights:

I do at least 1 or 2 runs of approximately 16km or 22km each week regardless of my long run
I attended the New Zealand Mountain Running camp in week 4 of the plan and ran about 60kms in 4 days with two back to back runs over 2hrs duration
I am recovering faster and can run a 14km run at steady pace
I ran a 5km PB (20:28) at Park Run on week 3
Ran a steady 25km run in just over 2hrs at an average pace of 5min per km

New Events

Rotorua Half Marathon on 4th May – My goal is to use this race to beat my current Half marathon PB of 1:33
Xterra Trail Series – Trail Running Series (4 events) from April to June!
Wellington Scottish Athletics Club Races – TBC

Major Updates to the 16 Week Training Plan (Actually 11 weeks to go)

Added 3 runs of 35kms to the plan leading into the Marathon
Extra Tempo and Interval sessions and Goal Pace runs
Track work 1600m repeats and 800m repeats

Below is the breakdown of the updated plan!

Completed 5weeks Marathon Plan

Note that on Sunday 7th I am running another off-road trail/mountain run of 18km at the Porirua Grand Traverse event. A recap will follow as usual. Head over here to get the latest updated Marathon Plan.

Tongariro Trail Running Camp Easter weekend recap

Posted on April 3, 2013 by Run Wellington

Last weekend (Easter break of 4 days) I signed up to be part of an organised weekend of running in Tongariro National Park. The event was organised by one our club runners Glenn Hughes who has competed in International Mountain Running events representing New Zealand. The biggest draw card for this weekend was that Jonathan Wyatt (six-time world mountain running champion) one of New Zealand’s top athletes of all time was going to be attending the camp! Read his bio here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Wyatt He has an impressive list of wins and also is as far as I know the NZ’s fastest half marathon time record holder in 1hrs 02mins 37secs! Talk about being fast! He is very humble about his achievements and to have him at the camp was just inspirational.

Update from Michael via comment 6th April 2013 – “Rod Dixon is the fastest NZ half runner (1:02:12 in 1981) but Jono is the NZ 10km record holder (28:04 in 1996).”

Camp Recap

The camp was held at Discovery Lodge and scheduled from Friday afternoon with a first group starting at 3pm. Unfortunately I was late leaving Wellington and got stuck in Easter holiday traffic going up North along the coast. However I got to camp and went for an easy solo run in Whakapapa Village. There are so many nice trails to explore! In the end I ran along to a place called Silica Rapids on one of the trails. In the evening we had a great dinner and discussed what the rest of the weekend would look like in terms of running.

Whakapapanui Trail

Saturday morning after breakfast we got transported to start of the Whakapapnui trail which leads all the way up to the top ski field in Whakapapa via the Whakapapaiti Hut. (It’s just end of summer here in NZ so no snow). The plan was to follow this trail and regroup at the hut and then climb up to the ski field area. Of the 14 runners I was the slowest in terms of average pace on trails and climbing. Luckily we formed two groups and I was in the ‘slower’ paced group. Somehow on the way (mainly because I was slow :-)) I got a bit side tracked and lost myself and soon realised I took a wrong turn. Nevertheless I was able to back track and re-join the others who were half way down looking for me. We ended up climbing up to the ski area with some great views over the valley below.

From top of Ski Field

Here is what the trail looked like. Around the 10k mark I took a slight side trip 🙂 Total of about 18ks run.

Elevation Profile for Run up to ski field

I was pretty bashed after that run! At the top we enjoyed some great views and coffee from the cafe!

Running Group with Jono Wyatt and others

That evening we ended up in Owhango where some of the runners did a another trail and went to the Owhango pub for dinner and back to base for a well earned rest and sleep!

On Sunday we set off again and decided to do part of the Tongariro Northern circuit. The trail started from Whakapapa Village and to some degree it was a reverse of The Tussock Traverse event I did in January this year. This was an awesome run of about 22ks, not much of climbing and through some great trails! I really enjoyed this day! The trail ended on the Desert road where we got picked up. We then drove to the town of Turangi for lunch/coffee and then on to Tokaanu for some recovery in the famous geo thermal hot pools! Great day!

Whakapapa Village to Desert Road

In the afternoon/evening we all relaxed and shared stories then watched a movie about Kilian Jornet, A Fine Line. Great movie and highly recommended. It was a great weekend and I made some new friends and heard so many great stories about why each of us have chosen running and being in mountains, trails and enjoying life!

Monday morning we did another easy trail around Lake Rotopounamu near National Park and then after breakfast said our good byes and headed back to Wellington!

I am planning to organise another event myself for those who would like to explore some new trails and get out of their comfort zone. This was definitely outside of my comfort zone but I enjoyed every bit of it!

Group getting ready for another run!

Here is a great video featuring Jonathan Wyatt!

Happy trails!

Mt Lowry Extreme Challenge event recap

Posted on March 24, 2013 by Run Wellington

Today was not my day, today I got owned by the trail, nevertheless it was a great experience. Onwards and upwards!

The Mount Lowry challenge consists of two events, The Bridgedale classic mountain trail run (11km) & the Vasque Extreme challenge (22km) mountain run with about 1000m of height gain on the course, the Extreme challenge was limited to only 50 participants. I entered the Vasque Extreme event & this is how it went. This event is known for it’s hilly terrain & has it’s own legendary status because of champion mountain runners Melissa Moon & James Coubrough.

The event location is about 30mins drive from where I live in a small sea side town called Eastbourne in Wellington, New Zealand. My event was scheduled for 8:30am with registration & race number pickup from 7:30am. I got there around 7:45am to pick up my number & check in. There were a few of my buddies from Wellington Running Meet up group who were doing the event as well. So I had some company to have a bit of pre-race banter.

Buddies from Wellington Running Meetup. – Kathy, Me, Dom and Ash

There is a great community feel to the event because it’s locally operated, they even have special prices for local participants. The event HQ was in a little park so there was plenty of people gathered to cheer the runners.

Start of Mt Lowry Extreme Challenge

We had a race briefing at 8:15am then we were off at 8:30am sharp. I felt pretty good going ino the race, no sign of any niggles & I’ve been running pretty well for the last three weeks as part of my overall 16 week marathon training plan. This was an event I wanted to use to get some decent hill climbs into my schedule. My goal was to run most of the hills & try to run the 22km under 2hrs 45mins which was achievable in my mind.

The first 3km was pretty flat along the coastal road to the start of the trail head. I eased into a steady pace without pushing it too much around 4:30 per Km. From the start of the trail it climbs steadily for about 200m straight up, I was doing well around 6:00 per Km up to about 2km into the climb & then my legs just felt completely dead, like someone just hung two 100kg dumb bells to them & my calves were hurting like hell! This took me completely by surprise, I’ve run enough hills & never had this effect before! I was reduced to a painful but steady walk & about 4 people passed me, I was a bit mentally drained but just kept power walking up the hill. It was a painful climb but eventually got to the top. Stopped at the top & did some stretches, the pain was still there but since I was at the top, the trail evened out to being flat so I started a slow run. Eventually the heavy feeling on my legs subsided & I was able to run the next bit but much slower than I anticipated. At this point I realised I needed to forget about my time goal of 2hrs 45, ain’t going to happen!

Around the 6km mark is another steady climb, it wasn’t easy but I went on & in a weird way I was getting used to the pain & the heavy felling was getting lesser. The next 3km is along the top of the trig with a narrow trail which is full of tree roots, you had to watch every step but it was runnable. There was a cut off time at the halfway point at 11km where if you didn’t make it within 1hr 45 you get pulled off the event. I made the 11k point in about 1hr 30.

Mt Lowry Trail Map of the course

From the 11km point you entered into a forest where you had to pay very close attention to the trail as it descended steadily to the turn around point. This 2km stretch was a nightmare! You had to look up to check if you could spot the trail markers on the trees & you had to watch your step below as the trail was so overgrown & uneven with tree roots! Not fun! For a while I thought I was completely lost! And wait you had to do this bit twice as the route doubled back on the same trail to the turn off point. A few of the fast runners were on the way back including a couple of my buddies.

Anyways after this bit you come out of the forest into a well graded trail which descends rapidly. Uh oh – what goes down must come up! Essentially the trail drops from 300m to 50m & then you go back up the way you came again!

Mt Lowry Elevation Profile

The turnaround point was at around 15.5k where they record your number. Then you go back along the same up 300m! Just at around 16km as I was heading back two runners was coming down fast & me being the considerate runner took one side step to give them way & the next minute I was face down on the trail! $&@k & some other choice words followed! I think my ego was more hurt than any of my body parts as I took check of the damage! Arms OK! Knees.. Uh oh left knee was gushing blood but there was no pain! There was a piece of flesh hanging out but surprisingly no pain! I used my sweat band to wipe the blood away & continued on! A bit angry at myself but happy I hadn’t done too much damage, it’s just a wound & it will heal! Right climb up again & negotiate that forest bit then it’s a downhill! Quick look at my watch I knew I was way off my time I’d make 3:15 if I just keep moving! The last descent is just straight down & there was no way I was taking any chances so it was a slow descent to the bottom & into the finish line! Final time 3hrs 17mins.

Mt Lowry Garmin Summary

Usually after a race I haven’t done before I look forward to giving it another try, but this one I’m not so sure. Maybe after a few months I’ll feel differently. 🙂

Mount Lowry isn’t an easy challenge & it’s named the Extreme Challenge for a reason & today it owned me! I am however glad I took part! My knee is all good and wrapped up in dressing so nothing major. Next event is another mountain run – The Porirua Grand Traverse on the 7th of April!

At the Finish – all smiles despite how it all went! Patrick, Nicole, Me, Kathy, Lilla and Ash

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