Mel and I volunteered for this race last year. As a result we got a free entry this year. Mel's longest run ever! We made a pact to cross the finish line together.

I was a little put off because my Garmin had been on the charger for three days, I'd left it off overnight and prior to the run it declared low battery and turned itself off.

The run starts with 3km of uphill and undulates for the next 25km. The majority of the first three km was walked. Arthur's seat is hard, rocky, steep and causes much burning in the lungs. One wonders if the legs will ever come good. But once the top was reached running didn't suck and the pain of climbing forgotten.

The run involves plenty of concentration, all sorts of roots and rocks are there to trip you up. I had two near misses, Mel's were countless but neither of us hit the deck quite like others around us.

Considering how average I felt, lacking rthymn, tired, agitated about no timing device, fighting off inner demons (sh!t, there's 18 km to go) I'm relatively happy about my performance to the 23km mark. From halfway we were making ground and passing people. We stuck to a walk up hills run everything else strategy and when that wasn't working for me, when times got really tough I opted for a 30 sec run, 30 sec walk combo which I probably had to utilize for a total of a kilometre.

At 23 km we'd hit the point where you start to get glimpses of the Cape Shank shoreline. It's gorgeous and you know know know that you're not far from home. We had a nice little pack of 4 going at a comfortable pace. But I could feel that my calves were not happy. They were just itching to cramp. Any kind of uphill was a walk for me, then I'd catch up again on the flat/downhill.

At about the 27 or 28km mark my calves totally cramped. I could hardly walk, let alone run. I burst into tears, from the pain and mostly frustration. The tears were short lived thankfully, the cramps not so much. The finish line is slightly uphill and I was a hobbling mess, Mel pretty much had to drag me along the finishing straight. I've never endured a more painful finish.

I'm disappointed to have been plagued by cramps, I'm disappointed that I didn't 'run easy' like I experienced in quite a few of my training runs. I'm stoked that we went under 4 hours, I'm stoked that on the less than adequate training I did it and that I had Mel by my side (or just in front).

In hindsight I wish I'd made an effort to run more of the track during training, it makes for some seriously beautiful running. I can't wait to spend more time over the next year running along it.

Training on undulating terrain.
I wonder if I shouldn't have had some sort of electrolyte drink, salt tabs or something to help with cramp, or was I just underdone?

So good to stop running. We ate Vegemite and cheese sandwiches - yay something not sweet and waited for Pete to finish the 56 km


Talent. Cramps.