Race Report: Hoka One One Trail Series Race 5: Studley Park

I’m getting a weird sense of Déjà vu as I am writing this, as I’m yet again writing the words, ‘the race didn’t quite go to plan’ for a night race. The last time I wrote those words was for my race report 'Wings For Life'

You’ll find out what the heck happened shortly…

But first off can I say how cruel it is of Rapid Ascent to hold a race at nighttime? This is the first time they did it as part of their ‘Hoka One One Trail Series’, where we returned to Studley Park to run the exact same course of Race 1 (which I didn’t partake in) and it was torture leading up to the race. For me I usually get the pre-race nerves the night before the race, take ages to get to sleep and then wake up ready to run the race in the morning, but not this time. This time I woke up and the nerves hung around all day. It’s terrible; I was at work constantly looking at the clock slowly counting down the hours before I could leave for Melbourne. And it finally arrived.

Trail Racing at Night!

Heading down with me to the race was Kym (who was running in the short race) and Dad, the person I dragged along so he could drive us home while I was having a sleep (we both live about 3 hours drive away from where the race was). We got there with plenty of time to spare, which was good as I need a long time to warm up and also good for another reason. For the first time ever I got my ankle taped up by the guys at Physiohealth. (For those who didn’t read my last race report, I hurt my ankle halfway through a half marathon and continued to run on it for another 10km, NOT SMART). It’s been a bit under two weeks since I hurt it and have been running on it for the past week with no issues, but it’s just been on the road and track not on any trails. I didn’t want to reinjure it, hence the tape. Which also probably wasn’t very smart to be trying something new at a race, and it wasn’t, but more on that later.

 

Taped Ankle

I had another quick chat with Francesco, (who ran in the 5km this time as he had an ultra race on the Saturday morning, so he took it easy. He still won) went for a good warm-up and arrived at the start line with my head torch and ready to go. Only to find that my head torch wasn’t working. I ran with it just two nights previously for the first time and with brand new batteries, worked fine. Turned it on that morning of the race, worked fine. Tried turning it on when I needed it the most, it says ‘screw you’ and makes me go into a mild panic attack. 2 minutes before the race starts and the RD is going through the pre-race briefing, my dad finds me and is my knight in shining armour; fixes it by taking the batteries out of the casing and putting them back in again. It starts working again. Didn’t even think of doing that but pretty much as soon as he does that, the race siren goes off and I’m off and running, breathing a huge sigh of relief. But I honestly think it was an omen of what was to come.

The long race around Yarra Bend and Studley Park is supposedly the easiest race of the Hoka One One Series, it’s shorter than all of the others at 15km, it’s relatively flat at about 150 metres elevation gain and not too technical with (and you better be sitting down for this) some sections that are on bitumen and concrete *gasps*. Exactly the stuff that I haven’t been training for. In other words, it’s a speedy circuit. And I haven’t been doing too much speed work. So I walked into the race thinking 65 mins to run 15k’s isn’t too bad, and to try and achieve this I’d hit out the first 5k’s in a bit under 20 mins, with the expectation of majorly slowing down in the last 3-4k’s due to my muscles being fatigued from the lack of speed training. And for the first 5k’s the plan went perfectly, I got into a group consisting of Kelly Emmerson (which I didn’t know who that female was at the time, it was dark!) and a few others who all seemed to have the brightest head torches, so it was almost like running in the day! And to maintain that sub 4min/km is so much easier in a group. Then the race seemed to go into a downhill spiral.

I got through the 5km point in 19.50, then ran down the first trail hill and promptly fell over. Which was fine, I didn’t badly hurt myself. I got up, dust myself off and managed to keep up with, and pass the majority of that group that I ran with at the beginning. 1km later; however, I got a stitch in my right shoulder and it’s where I lost my rhythm. I was expecting to start to hurt 6k’s later, not then! I went from running easy, to running hard. And it didn’t seem to leave until the 8^th kilometre. The terrain helped to keep my mind off it, especially this steel bridge that we ran across at about 6.5k’s in. Completely unexpected and was cool to run across in the dark. Even with the stitch I was still making good time and made it to the 10^th km in 41.44, which made me start to think that I set my sights too low in terms of a time to aim for. I then readjusted my time and told myself to aim to beat 63 mins, plenty of time run my last 5k’s. For me, between the 10-12^th km was the most interesting and the most fun. There was nobody in front of me and one person a bit behind me so I had to rely on only my head torch. Which was lucky that the head torch; a ‘Black Diamond Ion’

My head torch that I won and run in, and didn't bounce around at all, which was good!

which I won as part of my last Rapid Ascent race, was up to the task. The single track went down to the Yarra River and got a bit more technical; I really had to concentrate to not trip up on any of the rocks or roots and potentially fall into the river! Lucky for me that didn’t happen, but something almost as bad did.

At the 12km point I developed a stomach cramp, the kind that felt like a punch in the gut. I occasionally get them, for unapparent reasons and the multiple specialists I’ve seen have no idea what causes it, how to prevent it and perhaps more importantly how to treat it. I went from doing reasonably well, maybe 5^th or 6^th overall, to dropping 5 places in the space of about 500 meters. I was practically slowed to a walk. It was demoralising and it hurt. The last 3k’s were agony, especially the point where I was jogging on a section of downhill concrete, where I should have been flying, which is where I got passed, again. And to top it all off I was starting to get a blister on the bottom of my heel from the tape that was put on earlier, perfect.

The beginnings of the blister

It was such a good feeling to see the lights and hear the music of the finish line at about 300m to go, it meant I had almost finished! I eventually crossed the line in (unlucky) 13^th overall and in a time of 65.58 mins, and first in my age group which I didn’t feel like I deserved.

Walking over the line

I was in such a dark place when I crossed that line, I was angry at how I performed and angry for my body turning against me for no apparent reason. And my stomach cramp didn’t let up until the next morning, so in what should have been a joyous occasion celebrating the end of a good series with a few beers, ended up me just wanting to make the presentations go a lot faster, and screw recognising everybody’s achievements. I want my recognition and reward, and I want to go home. It was terrible to be thinking those thoughts, especially since my running companion won her age category for the short course, well-done Kym!

Fake it till you make it?

This race definitely had the best prize too, thanks to Hoka One One. Any pair of shoes in their range, which is awesome! I’m still yet to decide. I also got a nice medal from Rapid Ascent for winning overall U20, and it feels great to have that title.

 

First!

My medal for winning the series

I’ve learnt so much from doing these races. It’s ok to walk up some the hills, different strategies work for different races, and how to run on different sorts of terrain, fast (which you don’t really do when it’s just a training run). I first competed at Race 2 back in 2014, before I had any idea what trail running even was. A harder form of x-country perhaps? But I’ve learnt it’s so much more than that and I thank the Rapid Ascent team for a great racing experience, time and time again. This is the last time I’ll be doing anything with these guys until I don’t know when (moving up north to QLD for uni next year); I highly recommend doing at least one of the trail series events, it’s the perfect way to dip your toe in trail running and see if it’s for you. I certainly found out it that it was for me.

The TRNWings For Life

Race Report: Walhalla Wound Up

Yesterday’s race at Walhalla certainly was far more interesting than it should’ve been. I should’ve been able to write that I took it easy and crossed the line in my desired time, and that today I don’t feel sore at all, but that’s not the case, unfortunately.

 

The centre of town and one of the hills I had to run up

The Walhalla Wound Up is definitely an event that everyone who has an interest in trail running should do, it’s super low key but has such an amazing vibe and the scenery is stunning. The hills are doable and there are distances for most fitness levels, with a 10km, a 21km and a 50km. I did the 21km; even though I raced last week, as I ran in this event last year and wanted to see if I could beat last year’s time; as well as to see how much my fitness has improved.

 

Some of the single track Walhalla has to offer.

The morning was stunning, cool but not too cold, with the sun shining, which was starting to warm up the valley by the time the race started. I, as per usual, got there an hour early to warm up, and was excited to see so many Sale and District (SAD) runners starting to turn up before the 21km started. It was during this warm up period that I was speaking to a SAD member and realised what this run was going to be; a ‘training race’. I was always going to take it fairly easy, but with it being a ‘training race’ I started to think I might be able to try out a different race strategy and see how it would work.

 

The SAD crew

I had a goal of running it in about 1 hr 40 mins and this was close to the time of the winning female from last year, Katie (who is a SAD runner) so for the first couple km’s I decided to run with her and let her set the pace, which was nice as it wasn’t too fast and I got to enjoy the view, and because I wasn’t racing it I stopped to take photos, which I haven’t done before. All my trail races this year have been stunning and now for the first time I tried to capture that, which partially worked but the photos don’t do the trail justice, you’ve just got to run it.

At the start line, first time wearing my Salomon S-Lab Adv Skin3 12Set (that's a mouthful) for a 'faster' run. Great pack, well done S-lab.

Starting to head up into the hills

After about 5km I decided to run that bit faster than Katie and left her, which she said was fine at the time and latched onto the leading female and used her as my pace maker. When I stopped to take a photo, she gained a bit of distance on me, when I started back up I had to speed up to try and keep the gap at an even distance. And I think that helped to keep my splits fairly consistent, even with all the stopping and starting.

 

Just happened to be a waterfall on the side of the trail

I felt great come the 11km point, which is where I had to cross an old, wooden, slippery bridge. It’s a beautiful bridge and I had to take a photo of it, so when I actually turned on to it I was only just starting to start running again. As I wasn’t going fast I didn’t think I would need to grab onto the handrail as I turned onto it, I should of. My right foot slid from out underneath me and as I was falling over my left foot/shoe smashed into the inside of my right ankle, which hurt, a lot. I then proceeded to hobble for the next 500 meters, as I couldn’t put any weight on my right ankle. The pain slowly subsided over the course of a km and soon I was able to almost run normally on it. I just adjusted my technique to focus heavily on landing on my left foot, which is why when I got to the aid station at the 15km point I decided to keep on going rather than DNF. The ankle wasn’t too bad at the time and I was about to run up the hill that I seriously struggled with last year.

Damn you bridge! Why do you have to have wooden planks?!

The hardest hill of the race climbs about 100m meters in the space of a km and I had to walk up all of it last year, and when I made it to the top I told myself that the next time I attempted it, I had to run all of it without stopping to walk. This year I felt great by the time I got to the hill (ankle not withstanding), muscles were fine and I wasn’t feeling puffed and I was feeling confident that I could run up it all. And I did, I didn’t see my watch drop below 9.30/km and I managed to pass 2 people whilst doing so. It was an amazing feeling once I reached the top, I had proved to myself that I’m much, much better than I was last year.

A view out into the surrounding bushland

I then pushed myself that bit harder for the final 5km (mainly flat) testing to see how that race strategy might work for me, where I passed two more people until I reached the final downhill (about 800m to the finish) where my ankle pretty well blew up on me. My brain must’ve just said, ‘you’re nearly done, no need to mask the pain anymore’ and man, that final bit almost killed me. Absolute agony. I managed to hobble over the finish line, and straight to the first aiders. It was amazing to see how swollen the ankle was, so was glad for the ice and the compression bandage that they put on. 

Whilst I was getting treated my mum came over and told me that I finished 3^rd overall, which was a complete shock! Since I started out towards the back of the pack I had no idea how many people were in front of me, and that I was slowly working my way though it, especially towards the final stages of the race.

 

Representing both SAD and Wellington Aths! And yes that is a baby shoe that I'm holding, best trophy idea ever

Overall it wasn’t a bad race, finished on the podium and beat my desired time coming across the line in 1 hour 38 mins 56 secs without feeling too tired, here’s hoping the ankle heals up in time for the Hoka One One Night Race at Stanley Park in two weeks time…

No run would be complete without post-race beers, a great turnout for the SAD crew. Well done finishers! (and to mum for taking photos and being support crew for the day!)

The TRN

Race Report: Hoka One One Anglesea Trail Race 2016

Pre-Race
Since I live in Gippsland my race preparation started at 8.30 on the Saturday (3^rd September) morning. The reason being I was finally using up my Physiohealth massage voucher that I won back at Plenty Gorge. It was good, I even learnt a new term; fascia line. 

Since I live so far away from where the race was being held, I had planned to stay with some family friends, and catch up with a mate that I haven't seen for years. Unfortunately the one day I was there he got called into work early, so the only time I spoke to him was saying hello and goodbye as I walked out the door the next morning. Thanks to the Low's for housing me and feeding me for that night!

 

The pre-dawn morning, on my way to the race.

Race day. 
Race 4 of the Hoka One One trail running series is held in Anglesea in conjunction with the Surfcoast Century, which this year is National Long Trail Championships. My race is on the Sunday with the 100km SCC held on the Saturday. 

The morning started off smoothly, I arrived at the start line an hour before the race was due to begin to do my warmup and get ready, but then something unexpected happened. I had to use my first aid skills. On my way back from my warm up run I stopped to get a coffee, whilst waiting for it to be made the person in front of me suddenly collapsed. When he was on the floor I was starting to put him into the recovery position before myself and the other bystanders could figure out what the next course of action was. However while I was doing this he came to, and we realised he had fainted. While we had him sitting down we discovered he had run in the 50km the day before, and that he also didn’t suffer any concussion as he remembered all the events leading up to the incident. After sitting down for a couple minutes he said he was fine, collected his coffee and then 5 meters later as he was about to leave the café, he fainted again. That’s when we made the decision to call the ambulance, as something wasn’t right. We got him sitting down on a bench after that and he kept on insisting he was fine. After that point though I don’t know what happened, as this was 20 minutes before the race was due to start; so after checking that the other First Aiders were good to stay with him, I left.

From reading other race reports you would have seen that for me, a warm up is vitally important and due to that incident the only warm up I did was a jog, which isn’t enough. 

The start line, photo thanks to Bernie Larson

Nevertheless I lined up on the start line, and what a start it was, on the beach with a huge number of spectators and the sand was a dream to run on, nothing like the stuff I train on. Hard and flat, almost like running on bitumen. In terms of effort I started out pretty conservatively, which kept me in touch with the lead group for the entire beach section (about 6.5km). The beach running was kept interesting with towering cliffs over the top of you which was just stunning to look at, along with a bit of rock scrambling at about the 5km mark, where one person excelled and looked like he was dancing. 

Those towering cliffs! © SuperSportImages/Rapid Ascent Content Pool

It was incredible and gained a good 100m on the front pack just by being nimble. I also got speaking to Francesco Ciancio, the winner of the 100km the day previous and he was saying he was feeling sore (understandable) and that he likes to come home fast, so a plan formulated in my mind of how to try and beat him. Off the beach and onto the Surfcoast Trail, Francesco and myself were sitting 4^th and 5^th and he was starting to slow down, so at about the 8.5km point I passed him. All was going to plan, but what was the plan? For trail running, it’s impossible to stick to a certain pace as the terrain is always changing, so I like to measure pace by intensity. 

The plan was to start off fairly conservatively intensity wise, warming up as it were and hit the middle section really hard, trying to put as much distance between myself and Francesco as possible, and try to make it home.

My Strava splits,
10th and 11th km's were a bit slower as
I gained some elevation

From the 9^th km I put the foot down, peaking in my intensity between the 12^th and 15^th km where there was a beautiful flowy single-track section. It was also during this section I had my Vfuel gel, to try and get me through to the finish line. From there though I started to fade a little and hit a really low spot at the 17km mark when I thought I only had 5km to go, as my brain can’t do math when I’m tired. When the maths was slowly ticking in over in my head and I realised that I had 6km to go I almost cried, 5km I can handle, but another 6km? It’s hard to explain, but running is a mental game. Your mind has to trick your body and at that point my mind wasn’t playing nice. Once I got through to the 18^th km though I was back in a much better mental space, back to being able to tell myself 5km to go, 5km to go.

Throughout this entire time I was constantly looking over my shoulder to see if Francesco was coming for me and even in the stretches were I could see a good couple hundred meters behind me, I couldn’t see anyone. When I got to the 21km point I was running along the cliffs that I was running underneath just a bit over an hour earlier, and I could almost see the finish line. 500 m later the course turned inland, and I had another glance over my shoulder to see that distinctive red buff that Francesco was wearing, and he was coming for that finish line super fast. 500m after that, he passed me. Looking back on Strava, Frank’s 21^st and 22^nd km were about 4 min/km. Mine were about 4.30 min/km. There was no way I could keep up with him, so I just kept plodding along in 5^th place. That’s all right, I’m still happy with a top 5 finish. Then we came to the final sand section that I was totally unprepared for, and it was soft sand too where I got passed again, coming across the line in 6^th place, 10 minutes behind the front runner; and 1^st in my age group in a time 1 hour 48 min and 5 seconds.

Made it across the finish line! Photo thanks to Bernie Larson

This race was my longest race to date, coming in just shy of 23km and I wouldn’t change a thing. I wouldn’t have started off slower and I wouldn’t have saved myself for the last bit because I haven’t ever been a great finisher; even when I used to run track. I think I wasn’t able to hold on at the end because I just wasn’t fit enough, and maybe because the course didn’t suit my strengths. I’m not that speedy and this course was relatively flat, and since I’m training to do well at 4 Peaks (Bright Alpine Climb), I’ve been focusing on strength and powering up hills rather than being fast on the flatter stuff. But I’m constantly improving and I’m happy with that. At this point in time last year when I did my first trail half-marathon at Walhalla, I don’t think I could have predicated I would be able to do so well at this sort of distance, and now I came 6^th out of 238 people and rubbing shoulders with national champions. 

The National Trail Champion, Francesco

Unreal. I’m coming full circle with running the half marathon at Walhalla next weekend, but going to have some fun with it. I’m not treating it as a race but more of a training run as my racing schedule is so full, and 4 Peaks is just around the corner so I need to get some solid training in rather than just racing all the time. That doesn’t mean I’m not going to try and beat last years time though.

 

Stoked to finish top of the podium for the U20

Thanks to Sam and the Rapid Ascent crew for putting on another great race, the volunteers who crewed the aid stations, the fans for cheering us on and to Sale and District runners who are my loyal training partners and never cease to stop inspiring. See you next weekend Walhalla!

The TRN