I had planned a longer run this Friday and decided on a trail I had not ran before,  an out and back over a 40k or so distance. I had been gradually adding distance to my Friday runs over the last few weeks and this one was going to be my longest for some time. As I mentioned before one of the few benefits of this COVID19 crisis has been my company I work for insisting I take 10 days leave before the end of June. Perfect, I took 10 Fridays in a row and dedicated these days to finding new trail runs around Perth.  Over the last 6-8 weeks I have found some epic trails and with my ever increasing posse of unemployed or furloughed running buddies. On the downside I only have two more Friday off but I’m secretly hoping my employer forces me to take another 10 days furloughed, I’m not sure I can go back to a five day working week !

Anyhow I had to go for my morning coffee and croissant at my favourite cafe, Georges in City Beach, served by the best Father and Son barista combination probably globally, Georges and Ben. As you will know from previous posts I persuaded Georges to run Delirious with me in February and he completed  the course while I DNF’d at 112k. He was also probably the only person to complete the epic four day event in the same clothes , most people changed daily. He is a character ! So after our normal morning social running banter I dropped my Wife and the boys (my two Golden Retrievers Sydney and Spencer) at home and off I drove the 50k to Chidlow to begin my adventure.

The plan was a simple one, run down the trail 20k, turn around and run back. This way I couldn’t ‘pike out’ and go shorter , assuming I got to 20k of course. I had a backpack full of food and enough water to get me to half way where I could refill , I hoped? By the time I started it was early afternoon and knowing I wasn’t gong to set any world records I packed a head torch, just in case. The day itself was another glorious one for running, slightly overcast and maybe a touch of humidity but just about perfect conditions.

I decided to get to 10k before I had my first banana stop and hit this target relatively unscathed and in good spirits as the video below shows.

I noticed on the various signs along the path there was a town called Wundowie at around the 21k mark so this seemed like a perfect opportunity to up the ante a bit and run a trail marathon, I mean what’s an extra couple of kilometres when you’ve already run forty ? From 10k to the halfway point things started to get harder and I’m sure it was all uphill, albeit more a gradual gradient compared to the monster hills I’d been tacking recently. I try to settle into a 5min/k pace but rarely hit the goal and found myself 30 seconds a kilometre slower. I wasn’t that worried about pace , this was a ‘time on feet‘ run and I knew in an out and back run you don’t want to get to halfway goosed, it makes the return trip unpleasant at best.

I eventually found Wundowie after a nasty 1-2k on the main road as the track disappears with no signage. I just kept running in the same direction hoping the town would be close and luckily for me it was.  After reaching the halfway point the Garmin was paused and I scuttled off into the town looking for an open IGA supermarket for some tukka and hydration. After a mars bar and some electrolytes , and the last water from the water tap (?) I was back on my way, albeit probably half an hour later.  By this time my legs were well and truly seized, one of the many benefits of being old! and the temperature had dropped enough for me to put on my running jacket.  Undeterred I survived the 2k road section (people in the country all drive like they are being chased by the police! I suppose it’s good practice for when they are eventually chased by the police , I assume that’s the logic? They are a funny bunch these country dwellers?) and hit the trail back to Chidlow, a mere 21k away, joy !

Funnily enough the first thing I did after hitting the trail was get totally disorientated and get lost. Now what you need when you know you’re 20k+ away from your car and the sunset is closing in rapidly.  I took the next video at around the 23k mark…

There was actually quite a bit of downhill running in the second half but not enough to save me from the inevitable punshment I knew was coming, but that’s the point of these runs. It’s not about pace, it’s more time on feet and distance. Mental toughness rather than racing toughness. Over the next few months I signed up for some serious races and need more of these testing runs to make me a mentally stronger runner, well that’s the logic, I do enjoy them, honest.  Next video is a few kilometres down the track, and I’m starting to realise what I have in front of me.

Eventually I hot the small town half way between Chidlow and Windowie, called Wooroloo. As you can see from the image below, it is a small town? By this time the sun was setting and I still had around 6-7k to go. (Although I convinced myself at this point I still had 13k to go ? ) I was never going to beat the sunset.

The last 10k or so was a struggle but I didn’t expect it to be anything but. As I have said before this run was about mental toughness and all I needed to do was finish strong to make the effort worthwhile, pace was a secondary factor albeit I was keen to see the finish. I did continue along at a similar pace for the remaining few kilometres but could have probably done with some more water and a carbo-shot or two, no worries, running hungry allows your body to learn to use the next source of fuel available to it, your own body fat.  Rather than fast burning carbohydrates your body fat can last you many , many hours,  albeit at a slightly reduced cruising pace but these type of runs teach your body to learn to use readily available fat rather than looking for cardohydrates and sugar, which burn quickly.  So the sunset, it did come and was magnificent as always.

Managed to reach 40k before I had to reach into my backpack for the head torch. Lucky I did as in Oz there’s no dusk as such, one minute it’s light, the next it’s dark, like a light switch. Anyhow I managed to struggle to the car and even ran around the oval to get the 42.2 distance because we’re all Strava addicted and whenever to run over 40k you might as well hit the magic marathon distance, be rude not to really ? The image below shows the last kilometre or two with the head torch on, what a difference to the glorious sunshine I started off in, that can happen when you run a trail marathon, with a lot of stopping for photos and video,  as well as food at half way. I think I had over an hour of non moving time (thankyou Strava) but that’s ok, these type of runs are more an adventure and half the fun is running to places you’ve never been before and just enjoying being ‘out there’ , alone with just your thoughts and  a Go Pro.

So mission accomplished, I had ran a trail marathon, been to places I had never visited before and even got to watch a magnificent sunset while running alone in the bush,  soaking up the ambiance. It really was a prefect end to the run watching the day turn into early evening and eventually night.  All that was left to do was a quick go on the massage gun before I started to drive the 50k or so home for some serious dinner as I was starving, running a marathon can do that to a person I’m told.

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