Q&A: plant power and the Pyrenees

By TrailRunMag

Victorian adventure athlete and dedicated vegan, Jan Saunders, was looking to become the first Australian to run 866km through the French Pyrenees in an inaugural endurance event, the TransPyrenea challenge which began on 19th July. She’s still out there, competing but facing tougher conditions than imagined, she is now in the La Pastoral edition, an abridged section of the full course, that is still brutal at 450km+

This is an interview with Jan before she headed out, as seen in the latest edition of Trail Run Mag downloaded from www.trailrunmag.com/magazines.

What does it take to run 866km and climb 65,000 metres in under 400 hours (UPDATE NOTE: or even 450km!!)?

Fruit and vegetables. A lot of fruit and vegetables, according to vegan athlete, Jan Saunders, who will rely entirely on plant power to fuel her way through this audacious endurance challenge as the only Australian entrant in the inaugural TransPyrenea, a mega-trail running event to be held in France’s stunning Pyrenees mountain range.

The 54 year-old from Smiths Gully, Victoria, is no stranger to endurance efforts, having competed in numerous adventure events from the Costa Rica staged ultra (250km) to local endurance challenges including the 100km Alpine Challenge and the brutal seven-day XPD Expedition Adventure Race. Most recently Jan fast-packed the 230km Larapinta Trail in central Australia in just five days, a journey that is usually undertaken at a pace that takes more than double that time.

But nothing comes close to what lies ahead in the French Alps: Jan will have to run an average of 55km per day, climbing more than 3500 metres each day. Overall she will climb the equivalent of Mount Everest from sea level more than seven times over.

Unlike other endurance events around the globe, there will be no aid stations. Jan will be self supported allowed only one fifty litre re-supply bag that she will have to prepare and made accessible every 200km. The event’s race director expects only one quarter to a half of the 300 entrants to even finish.

The fuelling challenge will be a minimum of 6000 calories between drop bags somehow contained in a pack that, due to the ‘fast and light’ requirements of the challenge, will need to be restricted to approximately 11kg, barely more than a domestic flight’s hand luggage allowance.

Jan assures that being vegan makes no impact on sourcing the high calorific intake, pointing out that some of the world’s best athletes share her vegan lifestyle, including Serena and Venus Williams (tennis), endurance running legend Scott Jurek, Jason Gillespie (cricket), Carl Lewis (Olympian), Murray Rose (swimmer), Martina Navratilova (tennis) and recently feted bound for Rio athlete, Morgan Mitchell, a vegan bound for Rio Olympics after winning the national 400 metre titles.

“Being vegan has really helped with everything: energy, health, the environment. I am one of those people who actually cares. It’s what I chose to do,” says Mitchell.

Saunders agrees that protein and energy requirements demanded by either intense sports like Mitchell’s or endurance pursuits like her ultra running can easily be delivered by a vegan diet.

“On these hard ones, I aim for calorie dense foods – a minimum of 140 calories per 30g weight,” says Jan. “ My favourite is a rolled oats mixture usually with chia seeds, Vanilla Sunwarrior Raw Vegan Protein Powder, coconut sugar, good quality salt, raisin or goji berries, sunflower seeds, coconut shreds, and powdered coconut water. I just add a little water and then eat on the move. It fuels me super well.”

Since becoming vegan in 2012 for ethical reasons, Jan – a former member of Victoria Police Mounted Branch with 33 years of service – has investigated the culinary terrain of veganism by opening a vegan B&B in Victoria’s Yarra Valley, hosting guests who are seeking something a little different from beer and beef.

Jan’s guests will be well catered for in her absence with yet another plant powered trail running athlete, raw vegan John Salton, taking over the kitchen as she takes her plant powered approach to the French Pyrenees for what will no doubt be more proof in the vegan pudding of how plants can perfectly power extreme sporting pursuits.

Jan Saunders began her TransPyrenea challenge on 19^th July. More race information (in French) www.transpyrenea.fr

Q&A Jan Saunders // Vegan Endurance Adventure Athlete //

Name: Jan Saunders
Age: I turn 54 the day before the race! Happy birthday to me.
Occupation: Vegan B&B proprietor
From: Smiths Gully, Victoria
The Race: Transpyrenea – www.transpyrenea.fr

Tell us a little more about the Transpyrenea, Jan.
It’s an inaugural running event taking in 866km with 65000m+ ascent along the GR10, a long distance hiking trail that weaves through, up and down the Pyrenees mountains in France.

Sounds tough, especially as a first edition event!
Yes, the cut off is 400 hours to complete it, or 16.5 days, which sounds like a lot of time but I know the time will slip away quickly trying to tick off 866km! There will only be 300 runners in the field – I’m the only Australian that I know of and the Race Director expects only 1/4 to 1/2 of field to complete within cut off times.

So no aid stations or support crews – how do the logistics work on that?
My goal is to complete on average 55km per day, dependent on total ascent, which on average will be 3500 metres, keeping in mind most days will have equal amounts of descent which can be just as tough on the legs, especially the quads!

In terms of supplies, I’ll have one 50L accessible approx. every 200km (or every 3–4 days) and mostly be self-supported. Being vegan I cannot rely on having the food I want to fuel me available in the public refuges and villages we pass by and through. So I will be carrying most of my four days’ worth of food for each section between drop bags with me.

Wow, so you’re running with a fair whack on your back, then?
My pack weight I anticipate – or hope – will not lurch over 11kg. But

It needs to include compulsory items of clothing for bad/wet weather, sleeping bag, safety items such as first aid kit, GPS and compass, map, head torches and spare batteries, water filter, portable charger, phone and minimum of 6000 calories between drop bags.

And sleeping – what is the plan?
I want to get an average of 4-5 hours’ sleep per night plus 1.5hrs-2hrs cumulative rest breaks to tend to feet and eat per day. I have a bivvy bag, a borrowed light sleeping bag, an Ultra Light Tarp from Terra Rosa Gear and a ultra light hip mattress that I used in XPD last winter.

What’s the eating plan look like?
Being vegan I don’t reply on anything external – be that the event organisers’ offering or on a race like this we go through villages and past refuges, so there is access to food in general. But I need to guarantee that I have vegan food, so I pre-plan and prepare. [Check out a list of Jan’s vegan race lunchbox in the break out below. Ed.]

In terms of how I eat on the run, I tend to graze. A little something every 30minutes to on hour keeps the tummy happy. I have something liquid early in the morning; I intend to hit the trail each day around 04:00 and eat my special oat mix when the sun is warm, maybe 8-10am.

So your nutrition seems well under control, what is the biggest threat to finishing? Blisters and tendon/ligament over use issues.

You seem to have a lifestyle that works well around your endurance training…
I’ve been training in a way for the Transpyrenea for two years starting with with Alpine Challenge 100km in 2014. I then undertook multi day solo hikes in high country and on the Larapinta trail plus competed in the XPD expedition adventure race in 2015. This year I’ve done a few more mini solo missions as well as a 48-hour adventure race and a second go along the Larapinta Trail – 223km end to end in 5 days with a 15kg pack. That was about 9000m ascent and averaged 50km most days on rough terrain and warm weather so was an excellent training session!

Have you always been an endurance athlete?
Not really. I only really started undertaking serious endurance challenges in my mid forties – I’m edging into my mid fifties now. I was always active with gym and aerobics in 80’s/90’s and a bit of running off and on. Then I got into some hiking in the 2000’s and did an Oxfam (100km trek) in 2006. Plus I trekked in Nepal and climbed Kilimanjaro in Tanzania around then.

My foray into Adventure Racing only kicked off in 2008 at 45 after deciding it would be fun to do something different as I’d stagnated a bit.

At that stage I had never paddled or ridden a mountain bike or navigated. In fact I hadn’t ridden a bike for 18 years!

Then the adventures just followed: I climbed Aconcagua (Argentina, 6962m) in 2009 and Ausangate (6384m, Peru) in 2011 and did the XPD for the first time in 2010.

Sounds like you jumped in the deep end – did you encounter any big dramas while navigating your way into the world of endurance sports?
I injured my back at work – I was a policewoman in the mounted (horse) division – in 2011 and had 18 months off recovering with plenty of setbacks. As an active person who had not long discovered a pure love for adventure sports, it was a difficult time full of doubt. But it was also a time where I reassessed a lot in my life – from my career to how I lived. It was the time, in 2012, that I became vegan for ethical reasons.

So you quit your job, went vegan, and started a vegan B&B – talk about a life change! How did you get back on track in terms of the ultra adventures?
In 2014 I signed up for the Coastal Challenge in Costa Rica, which capped off 11 months of backpacking the world. All the time while travelling I was getting stronger and deciding on what direction I wanted to take with my life as didn’t want to stay in the Victorian Police (I joined 1983). I finished 10th Female in Costa Rica and my back was great! So I ran a few more ultras in 2014 including GOW100, Buffalo Stampede 75km, Wilsons Prom 60km and another Alpine Challenge 100km. I’m hoping it all stands me in good stead for the Transpyrenea!

Lots of non-vegan athletes are skeptical about how you can maintain the required nutritional input from a vegan diet when undertaking endurance sports. How did you manage the transition?
When I found out late 2011 into 2012 that it is possible to survive without consuming any animal product at all it became a no- brainer that I would become vegan. But it didn’t really click over in my mind till a few days after my 50th birthday as I contemplated a leftover spit roasted lamb.

I suddenly really thought about who it was not what…I’d simply assumed without ever investigating it for myself that we needed to eat animals and milk and eggs to be “healthy”. After all, that’s how all the advertising and traditional health advice went. I just “swallowed” that, like most people do.

But once I knew it was possible I knew I didn’t want to be the cause of animals suffering and being killed simply because that’s the way I’d always eaten. So I stopped. I was relieved and excited though when I read Scott Jurek’s Eat and Run and Rich Rolls Finding Ultra, which gave me the confidence, that endurance pursuits and veganism were not mutually exclusive concepts!

You take that lifestyle a step further with your vegan B&B retreat…
I believe in leading by example and supporting people where they are at without sugar coating the facts. At my B&B, The Beet Retreat (www.thebeetretreat.com.au), I provide a safe and friendly space for people to sample the lifestyle and ask questions without fear of being judged or ridiculed. We have great conversations over meals and around the kitchen bench as I prepare food! I also use my endurance adventures as part of my advocacy to show a) what is possible and b) to fire people’s imaginations and awareness of both their health and the plight of animals and the many amazing organisations doing incredible work on their behalf.

I’m passionate about both animals and humans thriving and living a full and beautiful life. I have found my niche doing what I do although it is a juggle doing both the adventures and running a business!

Indeed – your Pyrenean adventure is in part about raising awareness and funds for?
Ah – glad you asked … five organisations that I am personally connected with: Animal Liberation Victoria; International Anti Poaching Foundation; Gunyah Animal Healing Sanctuary; Freehearts Animal Sanctuary ; Project Hope Horse Welfare.

YOU CAN HELP JAN REACH HER FUNDRAISING GOALS HERE:
https://give.everydayhero.com/au/plant-powered-the-pyrenees-run-for-animals-the-hardest-yet

Not just living the dream then Jan, but walking – or running – the talk!
I believe that to live a truly healthy, happy and meaningful life we need to not only be authentic, but to align ourselves to our deepest core values and live by them, not just in our down time but all the time. It won’t usually make you wealthy but it will make you love and be very grateful for your life and your place in the world

PLANT POWER IN THE PYRENEES

What does Jan Saunders endurance lunchbox look like?

Calorie dense foods – minimum of 140 calories per 30g weight
Jan’s favourite is 2 zip bags of a rolled oats mixture with chia seeds, Vanilla Sunwarrior Raw Vegan Protein Powder, coconut sugar, good quality salt, raisin or goji berries, sunflower seeds, coconut shreds, powdered coconut and water.
Turbo Super Food mixed with the Sunwarrior Vegan Protein Powder and Vital Greens in a concentrated liquid mix.
Tailwind for pick-me ups.
Turbo and Hammer electrolyte.
Various raw vegan bars or Fruit Leather I buy or make myself.
A tube of Vegemite to suck on.
Nut butters.
Active Green Food bars. Hammer bars on occasion.
Fresh and dried fruit. I crave fresh fruit and hope to source some at villages. If I can get avocado I will be over the moon!
Salty pretzels and nut mixes at the end of the day.
Coconut water in drop bag if I can fit it in!
I never feel the need to cook or have warm things but if the weather turns bad I will have a couple of emergency soups and an instant cos cous to treat myself with.

Read Jan’s blog about her vegan and adventure life here: www.thebeetretreat.com.au/blog/

101 Reasons to run Ultra Trail Australia

By TrailRunMag

While plenty of attention is garnered by the front runners, we reckon the more moving and inspirational tales of ultra running are found further back in the pack, as with the likes of Brett Sammut whose story from 2015 ran in Edition #17 of Trail Run Mag. With Ultra Trail Australia happening this weekend, we thought it worth a look back at Brett’s experience in the Blue Mountains.
WORDS: Chris Ord

When life becomes too much, some run away to oblivion. Others, like Brett Sammut, reach the precipice but use running as a way to step back and rediscover a reason to live, and then some.

But what happens when the spectre of failure looms large on the trail to redemption, as Brett faced attempting his first UTA (then The North Face 100)?

The night was a darker pitch than any before. A suffocating weight of blackness tunnelled vision down to transient sweeps of light cast by passing cars. A two-hour walk of wallowing pain echoed as barely ten minutes, but every second of it was unbearable, like seventeen years of pain focused through a magnifying glass; beams of a black sun searing into his mind, charring it like the sun burns a dried autumn leaf.

In that moment, there was a clear, definite and imminent end to this phenomenal feat of endurance for 43-year-old New South Welshman, Brett Sammut.

He was about to quit in the most final way he could imagine.

From his perch on a gutter leading nowhere, on the fringe of a regional city the ex-policeman had served and loved and hated, Brett was preparing to throw himself in front of the next speeding truck that happened along.

His enduring to that point in his life was of a kind more miserable, intense and soul-shattering than any ultra runner – even at their lowest ebb – could ever imagine. Unless, that is, an ultra runner out there has ever been moments from throwing themselves in front of a speeding B-Double, Brett’s preferred method of ending his inner turmoil.

It wasn’t the first time Brett had tried to take his life. A policeman for 17 years, Brett was used to staking out dark corners on the hunt for people who wish and inflict harm on society. He was used to long chases. Long hours. Long nights. Like anyone exposed for an extended period to the raw pain of other people’s lives, Brett suffered. The things he saw, the things he had to do, to deal with while in the Force wore him down to the point where he joined those he usually chased into the gutter, albeit in a more literal sense.

The North Face 100 2015 // Aurora Images

“I was an overweight copper,” says Brett whose peak was around 118kg. “I left the police with diagnosed depression and anxiety. I felt worthless. I knew why I’d become depressed: it was a combination of seeing things that people shouldn’t see and doing things people shouldn’t have to do.”

A beer drinking culture within the force where colleagues drank to forget the worst shifts didn’t help.

“I didn’t drink beer so I was a bit of an outcast, but also, I had no real release valve like they did. I’d go home, not wanting to talk to my wife or daughters about the things I witnessed. I just bottled it up.

“One day my bucket spilled and I had a bad (mental) crash. That’s when I first tried taking my own life. I’m just grateful that the truck never came. I would have missed out on so much. It was a wake up call I needed.”

The following day, in a cloud of confusion, Brett sought a doctor and got the help he desperately needed. The solution, however, was a bitter pill to swallow.

“Medication,” says Brett. “I hated taking that medication.”

IMAGE: Chris Ord / Adventure Types

“To me, it was a sign of a failure. I know it was needed to help me. But I resented taking the medication and to get up every morning and take a 10-milligram pill was hard. The the first few weeks I flushed them all down the drain.”

It wasn’t long before Brett was forced to spend time in a psychiatric hospital.

“That was devastating,” he recalls. “One moment I am a policeman, with the power to take someone’s life or liberty in just circumstances, the next minute I’m locked in a room for three months, my own liberty taken, with no power to do anything.”

Brett had hit his rock bottom.

“I got diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder, a few anxiety disorders and suicidal tendencies. I also had a diagnosis of a perfectionist disorder.”

Before being hospitalised, Brett had taken to running in order to lose weight. “But I read somewhere that running could also help ease reliance on medication, so I had thoughts of using that as part of my therapy.”

With some skepticism, Brett’s doctor prescribed he go for a run, on an assumption he would fail and they could get back to the medicated course of action.

“He was trying to expose me to a ‘safe’ failure, I guess, as part of my treatment. But he didn’t want me to really use running as part of treatment.”

Despite no training, Brett travelled to run the Canberra Half Marathon, his first.

“I loved it. It wasn’t necessarily what my doctor wanted – me to love the running – but I did.”

It’s not unusual to find perfectionists or indeed obsessive compulsives, out on road or trail, monitoring to an inch of their lives time splits, calorie counts, and race pace. Indeed, sometimes for those with personalities locked like a homing missile on the intricacies of measurement in running, the sport can be harmful. Had running just become another mask for the pain, an addiction akin to his beer drinking colleagues back in the force, albeit arguably healthier to all appearances?

“To a degree, yes, but really for me it was about the participation medal,” says Brett. “It was about the achievement, the sense of completing something, more so than being good at something.”

“When I stopped being a police officer I became a nothing,” he explains. “That was how I identified, even though of course I was a father, a son, and a husband. But so much of your being is wrapped up in what you do when you are a policeman. When it is ripped away, you are at a loss. For me, rightly or wrongly, there was no real reason to live. There was no reward. To live, I still needed the thing that was in fact killing me.”

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While running and the medals on offer were no doubt a safer substitute for his achievements as a police officer, he admits to still using running as a way to escape problems, rather than face them.

“Leaving town was the reason I started running in a lot of events. In the first year after getting out of the psychiatric ward, I raced twelve half marathons. It was getting out of Orange. Getting out of town. Leaving everything behind me. I could actually relax doing that. And then driving back home I had that little medal, which to me is someone saying ‘you did well’ which you don’t get in hospital.”

Brett’s journey to the trail and ultimately his first attempt at this year’s The North Face 100, went via some triathlons and road runs, before he signed up to a Running Wild 6-Hour event in the Blue Mountains. The fit was instant, Brett describing how there was something more alluring, more medicating, more comfortable about the trail running scene that plays an important part in his ongoing recovery.

IMAGE: Chris Ord / Adventure Types

“Trail running it seems like a little family. I was accepted straight away. And not as Brett the depressive, Brett the suicidal guy, or Brett the ex-copper. I was just Brett the guy who could run. Like everyone else there.

“There was a sense of not only acceptance, but also community, and I think that is unique to trail running as compared to the road running scene where you don’t know anyone, and no-one wants to know you.”

The friends Brett gained from running quickly replaced those from his policing days who had quickly fallen away when he became ill.

“There is still a lot of stigma attached to mental illness within the police force,” says Brett. “But I’m happy to say that the trail running friends I have gained are a much better, more accepting bunch.”

The environment he was beginning to immerse himself in also played their part, believes Brett.

“It can be so peaceful on trail. I think that helps clear the mind for people like me. There’s no cars, traffic, noise, no clutter…”

Brett firmly believes running and treating depression go hand in hand.

“Trail running in particular amplifies that level of recovery process. My medication levels have dropped the last six months, and I attribute that to the trail. Even when I was running road, I still required my full dose… there’s crowds, cars, people hating on you for being a runner – it remains a place of heightened anxiety. There’s none of that in the bush – just birds and space. Even when you trip over you can laugh it off – you’re by yourself, there’s no one else to blame – and you get back up and run. There’s something about the environmental aspect of the trail that definitely lessens my anxiety, lessening my reliance on medication, which was the aim from the beginning.”

IMAGE: Chris Ord / Adventure Types

Fast forward through Brett falling in love with singletrack, and we’re standing in the crisp night as crowds mill atop the cliffs of Luera, in the Blue Mountains, filing in to collect their race packs place for tomorrow’s The North Face 100. For many, it will be the biggest challenge they have ever faced. The question that hangs heavy in the air anchoring the nervous chatter, is will they achieve it?

For Brett, that weight of expectation has extra gravity. What happens when a man battling mental illness, someone whose daily nemesis is the prospect of failure, faces something as tough as running 100km; what happens when he faces a race where the Did Not Finish rate is one in three?

While others are anxious about how their body will hold up, for Brett – having now been physically fit for two years – the spikes of anxiety are more about how his mind will hold up to the rigors of an ultra.

The question was answered at Checkpoint Three, but it wasn’t his head that caved in to the challenge. After 47km, it was his body. Three hours of being violently ill, vomiting, cramping and becoming dangerously dehydrated, Brett faced his inner demon and pulled the pin.

“My first thought was of letting down my family,” says Brett. “I thought about what I had sacrificed for the race, and more importantly what my wife and kids had sacrificed for me to race.”

Those thoughts alone would have cut deep for Brett, or for any family man. But what Brett hadn’t let on was that his wife, Francine, has terminal breast cancer, and he is her primary carer. Time, therefore, is of the essence, and both he and his wife had sacrificed a sizeable chunk of it for Brett to run in The North Face 100. Their family’s collective sacrifice in seeing less of their husband and father in a precious period of life, where death again threatened, was arguably much more of a black hole than your average ultra runner’s time vacuum.

IMAGE: Chris Ord / Adventure Types

“There were tears when I met up with my family. They were waiting at checkpoint four with homemade signs and banners,” says Brett.They, of course, were a bedrock of support. Dad was safe. Husband was alive. All was well.

“That first hug from my wife was heavenly.”

“Quitting was hard. I felt like a failure again. My goal was to finish. I failed at that goal. But I look at it now – I am healthy, I didn’t get injured. A year ago I would have been in worse mental state by quitting. But I’m proud of what I did regardless – I ran further than I have ever run before.”

Determined to turn the situation into a positive, Brett remained on course to help fellow runners who were racing without support.

“The race was meant to be a chance for me to fight my personal demons and score a victory, but while I failed in this instance, I still saw it as a chance to help others to achieve their goals. So I spent the next few hours and into Sunday morning helping strangers to get through checkpoints and lifting their confidence in their ability to get the job done; to be able to keep moving and keep putting one foot in front of the other.”

“It was the best thing I could have done. I never realised how much joy it would give me, especially when it came to seeing the names of people I helped on the finishers list.”

“That’s what I take away, that to me running is not about times, placings, results or, now I have come to accept, even finishing. It is the chance to be a part of an amazing community and the feeling of belonging.”

A few years ago, Brett Sammut felt overwhelming reason to embrace death. On the trail he found reason enough to live. Trail running gave him strength enough to face failure when it visited 53km short of his long-imagined success. And it continues to give him 100 reasons to live: the 100 kilometres he intends to conquer in the Blue Mountains in the future.

“I’m still on a journey and I want to keep coming back to The North Face every year,” says Brett. “First of all to finish, and then keep getting better. It’s my reward that I will keep looking forward to, keep living for.”

Addendum: In 2016, Brett is returning to run the 50km.

(*And the 1 in 101 Reasons headline? Of course, his two girls and wife…his family).

Brett Sammut’s blog on his The North Face experience can be seen at https://brettsammut.wordpress.com

If you or someone you know is experiencing depression or mental health issues, contact:

Life Line on 13 11 14 or www.lifeline.org.au
Beyond Blue www.beyondblue.org.au
Black Dog Institute www.blackdoginstitute.org.au

Rapa Nui Run: or how to win your own race

By TrailRunMag

Trail running has exploded in popularity across the globe, reaching into most wild corners of our spaceball (see what I did there? confused? does a ball have corners?), and now the last remaining outpost (perhaps) is about to fall to the sound of runners – or at east one runner – pounding the ancient soil at the feet of the giant Rapa Nui statues.

The Inaugural N.U.T.R. (Nui Ultra Trail Run) has been launched, to be held on 25 April on Rapa Nui / Easter Island, adrift from its mother nation, Ecuador, in the Pacific. .

This new off-road running event follows the 65km Ara Mahiva trail around the circumference of Easter Island.

April 25^th 2016 will see the running of the new trail event based in Hanga Roa, the sleepy capital of Easter Island (Rapa Nui).

Sydney based runner and travel writer Dan Slater will be launching the event, the NUTR, by running solo and unsupported around the coastline of this magical isle, a distance of approximately 65km.

Dan came up with the idea for the NUTR when he got the opportunity to visit Chile and needed a credible excuse to extend the trip to include Easter Island. He has since discovered that the route follows a traditional trail called the Ara Mahiva, and has only been run once in recent history (by Susie Stephen of longrunergy.com). If successful, the event may become a regular fixture on the trail running calendar.

As a journalist, Dan regularly writes for the Australian publications Australian Geographic Outdoor, Great Walks, Trail Run Mag and Wild, as well as numerous overseas magazines. His last running event was the 50km Wild Endurance in 2014, which he and his running partner won with a new course record.

Not wishing to lose that winning feeling, Dan is making the event an invitational and not inviting anyone else to participate.

“I hope to secure a win,” said Dan from his training ground in Inner West Sydney, “and I think my chances are good as long as I don’t fall off a cliff or run into a cow.”

Dan has a website and review blog www.thisisnotaholiday.com and has written a book about the trials of travelling through Africa on a budget of $10 a day.

Follow Dan’s run progress by visiting the official event Facebook page www.facebook.com/nutr2016

Edition #20 launched: Download free now!

By TrailRunMag

Edition #20 of Trail Run Mag (AU/NZ) has been released, and is once again packed full of dirty goodness from trails Down Under and across the globe!

DOWNLOAD your free pdf edition at www.trailrunmag.com/magazines or subscribe for iPad / Kindle Fire (access via same link).

In this edition:

HIMALAYAN REDUX – a return to the front line as Tegyn Angel takes on the Himalayan 100 //
FRENCHMANS FORAY – the magic of Marlbek, Tasmania by Majell Backhausen //
FAMILY MATTERS – journey on the Heysen Trail, South Australia //
PLANT POWERED RUNNING – fuelling your run with green power//
INTO THIN AIR – running Shangri La’s Snowman Route, Bhutan //
NATURAL BORN HERO – Born to Run author Christopher McDougall on being a natural //
FASTEST ’TASH IN TASSIE – itinerant international Felix Weber //
RETURN TO FORM – trail technique //
SPUTNIK’S SPRAY – claims to fame //
PLUS: AU & NZ editorials ‪#‎gearreviews‬, ‪#‎trailguides‬, ‪#‎shoereviews‬ & ‪#‎trailporn‬

www.trailrunmag.com/magazines

Runners earn their stripes at Tassie Trail Fest

By TrailRunMag

More than 400 runners – including a healthy interstate and international contingent – descended on the small tin mining town of Derby in north-east Tasmania recently, the influx inspired by the inaugural Saucony Tassie Trail Fest and $2 million worth of fresh trails to be run. [RESULTS AT: http://www.tassietrailfest.com.au/read-me/]

The three day event was conceived to celebrate a love of single track and the trail running lifestyle with feature distances ranging from 44km through 21km, 14km, 6km and 2km making best use of all-new mountain biking trails created within quintessential Tasmanian wilderness. Keeping runners entertained and informed off trail was a roster of running seminars, a trail running film festival and live entertainment.

In the premier King and Queen of Tassie Trail category, which required runners to complete a 44km marathon, a 14km run and a 2km time-trial, the honours were shared between a local running gun from Launceston and a German itinerant known in his hometown as ‘the fastest moustache in Cologne’.

Elite Tassie ultra runner, Amy Lamprecht, won the women’s crown and a cash purse, registering a cumulative run time of 05:46:48, beating home Yvette Edward (West Hobart; 06:00:34) in second and Victorian, Kellie Emmerson in third (06:07:08).

In the men’s, Germany’s Felix Weber held the King’s of Tassie Trails trophy aloft, but not before cycling all the way from Hobart to attend the event, via Freycinet Peninsua where he ran the long trail circuit (30km) to warm up, and volunteering with event organisers throughout the event in between competing. His total time for the King category was 05:13:54. The short sighted runner known as ‘the fastest moustache in Cologne’ and now ‘the fastest ’tash in Tassie’ has already decided what to spend his prizemoney on:

“Riding up here I lost my glasses. I have very bad eyesight and ‘run blurry’ so I’ll be buying a new pair of specs!”

Also on the dais was American runner who had come all the way from a stint working in Antarctica, Curtis Moore (06:00:38), and Hobart-based John Schuringa (06:10:48).

While the King and Queen was the premier racing category, the most impressive endurance competition was Multiday Madness, a category that challenged runners to run every single event possible across the duration of the event. That entailed a marathon, two 14km runs (a day and a night), another half marathon and the 2km time trial ‘Dash for Cash’.

The Madness women’s title was swept across the Tasman with New Zealand runner Amanda Broughton running consistently for the win, her performance surprising even herself as a short to middle distance cross country specialist in her hometown of Wellington. Broughton took the win in a cumulative time of 10:24:19. In second was Jessica Collins (Margate, Tasmania; 11:43:43) followed by Victorian, Louise Crossley (13:21:48).

In the men’s Multiday Madness, John Schuringa added to his King of Tassie Trails third place by winning the endurance competition in a total time of 10:12:22. Antarctic Station worker, Curtis Moore, added to his second place in the Kings with another in the multiday in a time of 10:15:37, with Launceston’s John Cannel registering third place (10:33:31).

Of course there were individual distance winners throughout the weekend, with special mention going to husband and wife team Reece and Jacqui Stephens, who juggled parenting duties to run in all events between them, each taking out a half marathon win and Jacqui taking home the $250 for the Dash for Cash title, her husband pipped at the post into second by Jerome Whitley who nabbed a time of 7:07 for the 2km (and likely a smidge) ‘sprint’ trail run.

The inaugural Saucony Tassie Trail Fest brought together trail runners from across the globe, with representatives from Chile, Mexico, Belgium, New Zealand, UK, United States, Netherlands and Germany joining running crews from every state and territory in Australia.

The host town of Derby has quickly become famous in mountain biking circles with the installation of up to 80km of new trails weaving through majestic stands of wilderness.

“The running experience is divine and like no other in Australia in my opinion,” says Race Director, Chris Ord from running tour and events company, Tour de Trails. “The huge stands of ancient forest, moss-covered rockeries, giant fern tunnels, and dam busting views make it a spectacular place to run, while the rollercoaster undulations, switchbacks and a few beefy ascents make the running challenging, especially for those taking on the multiday which is essentially 100km over the weekend.”

Runners were particulary impressed with the trails, the close knit community vibe and many noted the 14km nightrun as a highlight, with runners finishing under an arch erected inside a town hall, beer bar to one side and a live band in full rock mode playing on the stage just in front of the finishline. Impressively, the lead singer, Launceston’s Tim Gambles is also a trail runner and ran in a number of the events during the weekend.

Reviews by participants:

“What a privilege to be able to run through that bush and have those epic views!” – Multiday Madness winner Amanda Broughton, New Zealand.

“I volunteered and participated in the Tassie Trail Fest. It was an excellent and authentic experience with fantastic program on and off the trails. I can highly recommend this event to everyone who love to run in the bush.” – King of Tassie Trails winner, Felix Weber, Germany.

“Loved every minute of the Multiday Madness, stunningly beautiful but challenging course…Wow. Just wow.” Asha Mahasuria, Northern Territory.

“A fantastic event, a big thank-you to the organizers for putting on a fantastic event, hopefully everyone will get behind this wonderful event and it will grow bigger over the next few years.” – Tim Gunton, Tasmania

“Absolutely fantastic event. Loved every minute of it. Lovely people, amazing location, great trails. Thanks so much to everyone involved in organising the event – you guys were fantastic. Roll on 2017!” – Philip Judge, Queensland.

“Can’t wait to do it again! It was a tough course…that’s what made it so good! Thanks guys see you next year!” – Tracy Cron, Tasmania.

“Brilliant event. Well organised. Great facilities. Amazing track. Definitely doing it again next year.” – Kirsten Aylmer, Tasmania.

“We had a brilliant time. Great festival and a well organised inaugural event.” – Emma Pryor, New South Wales.

“We believe that the Tassie Trail Fest has installed itself as an slightly quirky, challenging, upbeat and iconic trail event for Tasmania and indeed Australia,” says Chris.

Also featured at the festival was Tasmanian local trail running heroine, Hanny Allston, an elite athlete who presented a seminar on training and nutrition, while fellow elite runner, Mathieu Dore, presented a masterclass on strength and conditioning for runners.

Organisers also screened the international Trails In Motion Film Festival as part of proceedings.

The weekend’s run festivities concluded with a 2km final time trial, a virtual sprint event in trail running circles, with the starter setting runners off at 30 second intervals and the winner not decided until every runner had laid down a time. That included the race organisers who downed organisational responsibilities for the morning to join in the trail fun and madness.

Organisers have confirmed the Saucony Tassie Trail Fest will return next year on the same Labour Day Holiday Weekend, which in 2017 will be 11, 12, 13^th March. They are encouraging runners to enter once entries open in a few months and, importantly, book accommodation in Derby or surrounding towns early, as it is limited.

See www.tassietrailfest.com.au for more details.

RESULTS AT: http://www.tassietrailfest.com.au/read-me/

Tassie Trail Fest is supported by Dorset Council, Saucony Australia, IO Merino, Black Diamond, The Running Company Launceston, Find Your Feet, Run Goat Run, Cheeta Recovey, Little Rivers Brewing Co., Kooee Snacks Australia, SOS Hydration, Break O’Day Council, Veolia, Weldborough Hotel, VFuel, Wildplans, Adventure Types, The Corner Store Cafe – Derby, S Group and Tour de Trails.

EDITORIAL: Technique of Ages

By TrailRunMag

Technique is about the little things, but also about the big things, like keeping you in the game in the first place, says TRM Australia Editor, Chris Ord. [This is the AU Editor’s editorial from the recently released TRAIL RUN MAG #19, out now. Download for FREE here.]

A general thirst for adventure led me to trail running. But technique has kept me in trail running.

I was a generalist outdoorsman – expert at nothing, dabbler in everything. Trekking, paddling, mountain biking…whatever it was, so long as it was in the Great Outdoors.

Blame a youth spent in scouts under a scout master who threw notions like uniforms, badge collecting and honouring the Queen and Country out of the tent flap in favour of midnight madness mega-hikes and coasteering without ropes or helmets. Thanks for that, Dad (he’d never get away with it these days).

If there was a running influence, perhaps it was that same scout master (I was never allowed to call him Dad, it had to be his scout name – Suba – taken from the first half of the name of his work car. His lieutenant’s name was, of course, Roo). Suba/Dad punched out eight or so Melbourne Marathons in his day. Never broke three and a quarter, however (3:17 was his peak performance). Perhaps the trail thing was seeded obliquely back in a youth spent cross-country running, the only sport I was anything better than below average at.

But I was not a runner. At least I didn’t call myself a runner.

So when I came to trail running – not much prior to the beginnings of this magazine – I had long lost the elasticity and supernatural recovery powers of youth. I loved being out on trail, in the bush, an environment in which I had spent so much time. But my running was hopeless. I could headstrong it through the distance. But I soon paid the price of absolute ignorance: ongoing, unabated injury. ITB was the worst, but my knees felt like I had severe osteoarthritis (or what I imagine that to feel like) – something akin to metal grinding and ceasing. It sounded bad, it felt worse. Running to the top of some steps I clearly remember stopping, and inching down like a decrepit old man. I was in my mid thirties at the time. My boss of the day bounded off ahead. He was around the same age. I thought that was me done with running before I even really started. That realisation was wrenching. I wanted to run. I’d spent a mid-life doing all sorts of adventurous things, but not running. And now I’d found it (or rediscovered it if you count the cross country), I wanted it badly.

So I did what any idiot runner does. I bulldozered on through the pain. I ran anyway. No idea why things just got worse. No idea why I didn’t consult anyone. Not a physio, not a biomechanist, not a coach of any description. Not even a running buddy.

Then I did what any other runner does do. I consulted not someone, but something. Hello Doctor Google.

Now, Medi-Googling is not to be recommended. But somehow it did indeed start the journey to rehabilitation by exposing me to one important thing: the idea of technique. I didn’t even know there was such a thing – as stupid as that sounds. I read up on how to run, even though I thought I knew. I mean, we run from the day we can walk, why do we need to learn any more about it? Okay, if you’re an elite, I would accept that technique makes you faster. But I wasn’t trying to get faster, I just didn’t want my knees to lock up whenever I took ten paces.

Following the black hole of tangents that can swallow days on the Internet, I ended up reading about form, Chi running, gait, cadence, barefoot, body position, breathing, core, arm swing. And I took none of it in. This is the danger of the Internet: awash with so much information, yet so little of it sinks in.

One thing that did stay with me was the danger of overstriding and heel strike. I leant forward a little. I started stepping on my mid-to-fore foot. Smaller, more nimble steps. It felt awkward, wrong, laborious. But then I left the screen and started my studies in real life. On a hill in Victoria, I watched elite runner Matt Cooper glide through the bush. Easy, with grace, and a smile. I wanted to float like he did.

In the mountains of Nepal, I watched, me the broken runner still ascending on an out and back, ultra star Lizzy Hawker springing down the boulder field, rock to giant rock, her wrists limp, arms out in front like a kangaroo, feet tap dancing. It was a flow of easy, efficient movement I instantly likened in my mind to Fred Astaire, Singing in the Rain. This at 4000 metres and 100km along the trail. She, too, was smiling.

And so it was that I decided to take my running lessons in the school of observation. I soaked up other’s technique – watching, feeling, and admiring. I chose my subjects by their lightness of being and their smile.

I banked away in my mind images of those runners. On a downhill bomb, I’d project visions of Lizzy’s (and Fred’s) dancing onto my own technique. Weaving along flowing singletrack, I’d get my shoulders back, engage the core, float over the earth, just like Coops. And, of course, I’d smile.

For me it was not about speed, nor winning, nor times, or even comparing performance against performance. It’s not even about being the best runner I can be, in a way.

What it has been about is seeking a more natural, effortless flow so that I may tap into and enjoy the more ethereal aspects of running: the seeing, the smelling, the feeling. If I make it easy on the effort, through technique, I get to relax and enjoy the ride a whole lot more.

And it’s about longevity. I’m not alone in not getting any younger. And the older I get, the more aware I am of my limited lifespan. Not just generally, but specifically as a runner. And my worry is that my lifespan as a runner will end before my lifespan as a human. And I don’t want that. I want to die on my feet. Running. In the wilderness. With a smile on my face. Thankful for the technique that allowed me to pass away while still moving freely in the environment that makes me feel so alive. Yes, I’ll die running and smiling wildly. Until that time, I’ll keep watching others who radiate effortlessly through nature and try my best to follow in their footsteps, so light they are.

Your observant editor,
Chris Ord, AU

Blue Sky Dreams – History of Skyrunning

By TrailRunMag

Skyrunning has firmly embedded itself into the Australian and New Zealand trail scene via events such as the Hillary and Mt Difficulty in New Zealand and Buller, Buffalo and the new Vertical K happening next weekend in Australia. While these races do an admirable job emulating their bigger-mountain cousins in the northern hemisphere, the epitome – not to mention the origins – of Skyrunning is found in Italy and within the hearts and minds of founders, Lauri van Houten and Marino Giacometti.

With the inaugural Vertical K happening locally (Victoria, Australia) in just over a week’s time, we present Talk Ultra’s Ian Corless who catches up with Skyrunning’s godparents on home turf.

Words and images: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

NOTE: this is an extended excerpt from Edition #18 of Trail Run Mag. For the full article download the edition for FREE at www.trailrunmag.com/magazines.

Biella, Italy.

A trickle of piano noise from the local music school weaves its way through open window shutters left ajar to allow some breeze, the heat of the day can be stifling. It feels and sounds like a scene in a movie. Cobbled streets, stone arches, a wonderful old square, the chatter of children playing and the smell of freshly brewed cappuccino in the air.

Biella, or should I say, the International Skyrunning Federation HQ (and home of Lauri van Houten and Marino Giacometti) is atop a hill in a walled village close to the Aosta valley, just over an hour from Chamonix and in close proximity to Monte Rosa and the Matterhorn. It seems the perfect location for the home of pure mountain running. Biella lies in the foothills of the Alps in the Bo mountain range near Mt. Mucrone and Camino.

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

“We moved here as the sports brand Fila were based here. In the 90’s they were a key sponsor for Skyrunning,” says Lauri van Houten, Executive Director for the International Skyrunning Federation.

“When Fila folded, we were left with a dilemma; should we stay or should we go? Stay we did and it feels natural and relaxed to be here now.”

Mountains dominate the life of Marino and Lauri. It’s not a job; it’s a passion that dominates 12+ hours of every day. You will see the dynamic duo at all the Skyrunner World Series races every year. In total, that is 15 events in 3 disciplines, VK (Vertical Kilometre), Sky and Ultra. But these worldwide events are just the visible face of what the ISF does. Behind the scenes it’s a frenetic, highly-pressured stream of telephone calls, emails, logistical planning and negotiations that make the Skyrunner World Series tick.

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

It’s a scenario far removed from 1989 when Giacometti set a record running from the village of Alagna to the summit of Monte Rosa. 25-years of mountain running and today, iconic names such as Bruno Brunod and Fabio Meraldi are once again being talked about in the same breath as Kilian Jornet.

“Older generations were already Skyrunners. My grandfather crossed the mountains working, for example. ‘We’ as Skyrunners added more speed but in essence it has always been the same thing, Skyrunners have always existed.” Bruno Brunod says.

“What I liked was going quickly to the summit. I felt the same when I was a kid in the pastures, I always ran up and down the summits that surrounded me. It is something I felt inside, something I liked.”

In 2012, Skyrunning went through a revival. After careful and strategic planning, the ISF launched the new Sky Ultra Marathon Series with Transvulcania La Palma and a seminar, ‘Less Cloud, More Sky.’ The sport moved up a notch and became something that runners all over the world aspired to. It’s was dubbed the ‘the next big thing’ but as Giacometti explains, “there is nothing new in Skyrunning. It is just now that everyone is catching up with our vision from so many years ago.”

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

Midway through the 2014 season, between Ice Trail Tarentaise and Trofeo Kima, I spend time with Lauri and Marino at their home in the mountains (the Casina) Corteno Golgi to get an inside look at what makes this couple tick and how the calendar and its logistics fall into place.

‘Casina’, Corteno Golgi. Italy.

The ‘Casina’ is a mountain house in Corteno Golgi close to Marino’s birthplace of San Antonio. Spread over two floors it is almost two completely different buildings. Upstairs is all wood, a combination of rustic/ modern and a wonderfully relaxing place that has been heavily influenced by Lauri. Downstairs is the original building, un-touched for years and one that harks back to Marino’s past. The garage is a Skyrunning museum of ice axes, helmets, shoes, race bibs, clothing, videos and old slides.

Surrounded by green fields and mountains on either side I suddenly see Marino in a new light. He is at home. He points at peaks and explains his childhood, his passions and I suddenly feel very honoured and privileged.

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

“The African Attachment (TAA) arrive tomorrow and you are going to be able to spend a couple of days in the mountains with Marino,” says Lauri.

“They are filming a piece on Skyrunning and they want to take Marino back to his childhood, revisit old haunts and film Marino running in the mountains.”

I met Dean Leslie and Greg Fell from The African Attachment at Transvulcania La Palma back in 2012 and since then we have kept in-touch and often crossed paths at races all over the world. I am excited at the guys arriving and the opportunity to work alongside them and shoot stills, a real perk of the job. Photographer, Kelvin Trautman is directing the film and although I haven’t met him before, we soon hit it off and I realise what is in store: two awesome days in the mountains.

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

The evening turns amazing. The sky is adorned with clouds and as we climb with cameras, Marino runs to the instructions of Kelvin. Looking for ridges and technical lines, Marino embraces the challenge and is arguably having the most fun he has had in ages. Days don’t get much better than this… at the summit of Monte Padrio the light is incredible and as the sun disappears for the day we are rewarded with a colour palette of orange, red and gold. Marino is in silhouette on the Skyline and I realise I am in a moment, a moment that I won’t ever forget.

The following day starts early with a short drive and we are suddenly looking at Marino’s childhood home. Marino laughs as he recounts boyhood memories.

“I used to go mushroom picking in this area.”

Following him up the trail, Kelvin wants Marino to go back 50-years to those mischievous days as a boy. Immediately Marino finds a mushroom, he removes his Buff and ties a knot in one end to create a cloth bag. Moving left to right on the trail, the bag slowly fills with the rewards from the land.

“In the Valle Campo Vecchio I would go skinny dipping in the river.”

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

Marino may well have regretted this sentence as just an hour later he was running along grass banks barefoot and then submerging himself in the ice cold river water from the mountains.

The warmth of the log burner in the Casina provided that ultimate feeling of contentment that one longs for after a day in the mountains. Marino’s body was aching, his legs heavy from the repeated running but beneath a tired façade I knew he had had a good day.

“We have plans for some very exciting races at high altitude that will be very technical in future years. 2012 was an important stepping-stone. Less Cloud. More Sky was an important phase in the development of Skyrunning. One thing that was apparent is the desire from runners for technical and high altitude sport. So, here we are following our heritage for a new era.”

I wondered: was it a happy coincidence that the revival of Skyrunning coincided with the rise of Kilian Jornet?

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

“It is no coincidence!” says Lauri. “Bruno Brunod was Kilian’s hero. Kilian followed his dreams from the inspiration Bruno provided, Kilian is now the epitome of Skyrunning.”

Kilian first arrived on the scene in 2006 and impressed immediately. He was a natural Skyrunner. As the profile of Kilian has grown, so has Skyrunning. It seems a natural process of evolution of the sport and to that end Marino confirmed his plans for the future.

“We need to expand, to grow and introduce Skyrunning to a new audience. We will go back to our roots moving forward. We would love to do a race from Cervinia or Chamonix to the summit of Mont-Blanc but this is not for everyone!”

As the day comes to an end, final preparations are made for Trofeo Kima. Kima, as it is affectionately known, is a shining beacon that personifies Skyrunning.

…continued. READ THE FULL ARTICLE by downloading you free edition (18) of Trail Run Mag at www.trailrunmag.com/magazines.

IMAGE: Ian Corless / Talk Ultra

Editorial: Yin to the Yang

By TrailRunMag

Editorial: AU Editor Chris Ord looks at the balance, or lack of, in his trail running lifestyle. This editorial appears in the current edition (17) of Trail Run Mag, downloadable for FREE here.

In my natural state, I am chaotic, unorganised, and essentially a lazy individual.

But sometimes life demands more of you.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still that same person sitting on the couch, eating fish and chips and ice cream watching endless episodes of Breaking Bad, wondering if my shed will be suitable to run an easy-money meth lab.

But somehow, today, life as a runner has demanded a little more of me. A little more organisation. A little more responsibility. A little more effort.

And, as a runner, it is demanding a lot more attention to detail than perhaps my personality has inclination toward. Attention to detail like, umm, training.

Essentially I’m on a mission to balance my running life of unpredictable, unstructured and unplanned running yīn with, for the first time, equal amounts of rigid, structured, charted-training-plan running yáng.

Now my yīn (shady side) is like Darth Vader’s force within (powerful and looking for total domination); the yáng (sunny side) is like pre-Yoda coached Luke Skywalker, all wide-eyed naïve and a little lost.

Barely two weeks in and I’m fumbling with the demands of scheduled training like Luke fumbles with the realization he’s related to Princess Lea. It’s awkward to watch.

My yīn approach to trail running has long been one of as-and-when-the-whim-strikes I’ll go for a training run. Trust me, the whim never struck at 5am. And if it did, I missed it, being fast asleep and all.

IMAGE: marceauphotography.com

The whim that did win out on occasion is the one that had me entering long(ish) trail events without sufficient lead-in training. That mostly ended in all sorts of agonizing wrongness (particularly embarrassing was the needless call out of ‘medic!’ at the finishline of Shotover Mountain Marathon). I am responsible for all my own embarrassing demises, of course, and that is one thing I do take full responsibility for. Indeed I usually document it, see TRM Edition 12 for the Shotover tale.

But the time has come to see if there’s any Jedi lurking within. Reason being, I have committed to an expedition run in the high Himalayas. It’s a project that would be fine to approach with a death-by-cramp-at-altitude-wish if it were just me up there. But on this expedition I will be responsible for guiding other runners. And if there’s one thing that will make me sit up at 5am on a crisp winter morning, it is the realisation that I’m to be responsible for other people’s lives as they trot up to 5000 metres at a rate of incline that risks death from cerebral or pulmonary edema. Even tapping that out makes me sweat more than my scheduled hill repeats ever will. It also induces me to do them. At 5.05am.

And so in search of my inner-Jedi, I have sought some Yoda-wisdom where the Force I’m aiming to tap into is conditioning and strength. While I can (mostly) blag the distances and I’ve completed a wilderness first aid course so medical knowledge is covered, it’s the strength and abating of injuries and cramps that I need to tackle. The latter is my Death Star nemesis (exhibit A: a near-death banshee screaming session as seen in Run The Planet, a TV show pilot that underscored my ill-preparedness, in that instance at 93km in a desert. Google it. Not in a workplace. Swearing involved).

So the yáng to my yīn has materialised in the form of not just one structured approach to training, but two, the other side of my personality being always to put in three chillis when the recipe says one and generally over-salt everything.

And while I wouldn’t say that I am yet to latch onto Skywalker’s singleminded focus (The Force is a long way from my grasp), I have managed to jump on the Bulletproof Legs bandwagon, a program from the crew at Brewsters Running. Then there’s an adjunct program from Lee Harris, a mid-east based Brit who is a multiday running machine and owner of Lifestyle Fitness Management. His knowledge about holistic training methodologies and a focus on core strength gives me faith he understands where I need to get to with this new-fangled yáng approach.

To my own disbelief, I’m enjoying the structure and routine. It’s a work in progress, my idea of ‘routine’ a long way from winning any Anally Retentive OCD award, but on trail I am seeing, even in these early days, results. Whowouldathunkit?

Even better, I’m enjoying the yīn side of my running more so thanks to the late arrival of yáng. On an impromptu jungle run in the Otway Ranges, south west Victoria, we ran in with not enough water (there were waterfalls so we were safe), no food and no idea how long we’d be in there for. The reward was one of the most stunning waterfalls I’ve seen standing proud in an ancient forest far from any human impost. It was wild and remote goodness, off the chart. What made it possible and enjoyable was the fact that I’d been training. The foundations are only a brick session or two in. And the Otway run topped out at roughly 200 metres above sea level, not 5000, so we’re not on training parity just yet. But I love that my new yáng is complementary to (rather than opposing) my beloved yīn. Light cannot exist without shadow. Performance cannot exist without training (it’s finally sunk in). And for my money, a training program will never be truly leveraged without the chaos of a whimsical wilderness run where anything can happen, but the legs are bulletproof enough to withstand it.

Your getting-more-balanced editor, Chris Ord

Check out the latest edition of Trail Run Mag by downloading for FREE here.

Masters of the Trail: learnings from Yogis

By TrailRunMag

Dan Lewis gets the Jedi mind trick low downs from those wielding the sabres of trail talent…

Brendan Davies, former winner of The North Face 100, says his thick new beard makes him look more intimidating and protects his face from the elements in his native Blue Mountains, but it is not a secret weapon in his bid to win the prestigious race again this weekend.

“It just seems to be all the rage in ultra-trail running now,” Davies said of the hipster-inspired big beard look.

That’s just one of the insights delegates got at day two of Australian’s first National Trail Running Conference being held in the Blue Mountains this week in the lead-up to TNF100.

After Race Director’s Day on Tuesday, today was Runner’s Day and Davies’ presentation on how he meticulously prepares for every big race did make you suspect that maybe even the beard on the previously clean-shaven runner was part of his well-planned plot to win a second TNF100 title.

Davies also coaches runners these days through his UP Coaching business and was one of a number of presenters at the conference to give his insights into what runners should be doing before, during and after trail running races like TNF100.

Others to share their wisdom included fellow elite runners Hanny Allston and Jo Brischetto, coach Andy Du Bois, race directors Sean Greenhill and Andy Hewat and US medical expert Dr Marty Hoffman.

Together, they covered subject matter such as choosing an event, nutrition and hydration, training, gear, developing an event strategy, psychology, pain and injury and post-race plans.
Some good laughs were had with a striptease designed to show just how silly the obsession with gear can be.

Davies highlighted how different TNF100 and Western States were as trail running races and how different his preparation was for each race.

His hot tip for this weekend’s TNF100 is wear trail shoes with some gnarly tread – “almost football boot studs” – because a lot of those Blue Mountains trails are still super muddy from heavy autumn rains.

Here are some other things that were learned from the day:

* Hanny Allston thinks 18 months ahead with her racing and ranks races as As, Bs and Cs. She tries to run just two A races a year where she gives it everything she’s got while the C races are basically treated as training run.
Don’t fall into the trap of always wanting to make the next race longer and harder than he one before.
For every 10km you run in a race where you performs to your optimum ability you need a week to recover, says Allston, so that’s 10 weeks for TNF100 runners.
Don’t just run the big ones like TNF100, support your small, local races as well.
On training runs of up to three or four hours you shouldn’t consume calories because you want to train your body to burn fat during races so it needs fewer calories.
“You are kidding yourself” if you think there’s big performance advantages from the electrolytes in energy drinks, says Dr Marty Hoffman. And pre-loading hydration before a race is also futile because the human body can’t store excess water.
Just drink to thirst – that’s going to provide you with adequate hydration. If you are not thirsty and your urine is clear before a race then you are adequately hydrated.
Drinking too much water causes hyponatremia, which can be deadly.
Judging hydration levels based on the colour of your unine during races is futile, Hoffman says, because hormones produced during running can make your urine look like you are dehydrated when in fact you have hyponatremia.
When it comes to hydration and nutrition, “listening to your body is really he key”, Hoffman says.
Maintain a high-carb diet in the week leading up to a race but don’t start the race with a bloated stomach full of food, says Andy Du Bois,
You can develop the necessary glycogen stores for a big race just by eating a normal diet.
The TNF100 has more than 4000m of climbs and descents and Sydney runners who think training on the Spit to Manly track is good enough preparation are kidding themselves, says Du Bois.
To perform well in TNF100 you need to do a lot of training on steps.
On your long training runs, make sure your pace is similar to what your race pace will be.
Walking and running are very different skills and unless you think you can run up all the steps in TNF100 your training should include lots of walking up steps.
Walk up the steps two at a time in training so doing one at a time will seem easier in the race.
There’s no research show core strengthening exercises like planks and crunches do anything to help your running.
Recovery runs should be easy but done on technical surfaces to help loosen all your leg muscles.
Jo Brischetto has 17 running packs – “one for every mood”.
Bottles are better than bladders because they make it easier to see how much liquid you have consumed.
No matter how cool they look, don’t wear ankle socks – they just let in the dirt that causes blisters.
Hanny Allston’s running philosophy is: “All in perspective and all in good time.”
Jo Brischetto’s favourite racing mantra she keeps repeating to keep herself in the moment is “one perfect step” while a favourite training mantra is “train hard, eat Nutella”.
Hanny Allston believes runners shouldn’t set themselves times as it just leads to heightened anxiety during races.
Jo Brischetto believes its important to have race goals that aren’t attached to times or places such as getting your nutrition right, avoiding chaffing or being mindful.
Brendan Davies tells his runners not to look at their watches during races.
Marty Hoffman says it’s important to be able to reset goals during a race if things aren’t going to plan so there is still some sense of achievement. Otherwise you feel like “you just screwed up the entire race”.

But our favourite bit of advice was Hoffman’s tip that the rock stars aren’t just at the front of the pack.

“You need to still think of yourself as a rock star in the middle or the back of the pack.”

www.thenorthface10.com.au

Trail run guide: Ben Lomond, New Zealand

By TrailRunMag

Your guide: Matt Judd from www.juddadventures.com

One could argue that New Zealand boasts more killer trails per capita than anywhere else on the planet. And if one did argue that, one would have to say that Queenstown was the capital, so close is it to a plethora of singletrack gold. Thing is, you don’t even have to step far from town centre to be able to tackle a monster mountain run. Matt Judd, usually found on the Gold Coast, nipped over the Tasman to have a play in the hills, Ben Lomond to be precise.

NEARBY TOWN/CITY: Queenstown (the run starts/finishes in the centre of town)
EXACT LOCATION: Skyline gondola base on Brecon St
TOTAL ROUTE DISTANCE: 16km (give or take)
TOTAL ASCENT/DESCENT: +/-1600m
TIME TO RUN: 2-3hrs for elites. 5-7hrs if you’re taking it easy and enjoying the views.
TYPE OF TRAIL RUN: Out and back with a loop
option to finish
DIFFICULTY: Hard
DEFINING CHARACTERISTICS: Native forest, breathtaking views of Lake Wakatipu and the surrounding mountain ranges, beautiful singletrack running
FEATURES OF INTEREST: The run takes in either native beech forest or douglas fir forest down low (depending which way you run), and opens up above the treeline to spectacular lake and mountain views in every direction. Do NOT forget the camera for this one!
FURTHER INFORMATION HERE
MAP HERE

RUN IT:
There are plenty of variations to how you start/finish this run, but this one takes in a little bit of the lake before taking you up the steep stuff!

1. From the gondola base, head down Brecon St to the lake. You’ll cross several roads during this time but the lake is a pretty easy landmark to find!

2. When you get to the lake turn right onto the wharf keeping the water on your left. Follow this until the wharf ends and a path begins, leading you beside Lake Esplanade heading out of town towards Fernhill. Follow it.

3. You follow the path for 800m or so where you will come to One Mile Roundabout. Here, take the right-most road (there’s a gravel path on the side) which takes you to the One Mile Creek Walk and the old power station.

4. When you get to the old power station take the straight-most option which is signposted. Be careful not to follow the mountain-bike only trails in this area.

5. The next bit takes a little care navigating as you need to follow the orange trail arrows randomly fixed to trees on the route. It’s not hard to follow, but you need to keep your eyes out for the correct way. The going through here is steep.

6. Continuing up, you eventually find yourself in a clearing (Midway Clearing, but this is not midway for your run!) which you will need to cross, finding the DOC sign to the Ben Lomond Track. Follow the track and after more honest (steep!) work, you’ll find yourself at the edge of the treeline.

7. 300m or so from when you break through the trees, there is a track junction at which you want to continue straight on in the direction of the Ben Lomond saddle. Remember this junction for the return journey. From here it’s onward and upward!

8. Follow the Ben Lomond Track up, being sure to lift your head up and take in the ever-changing, spectacular views of the surrounding region. You will eventually come to a DOC sign at the Saddle indicating the Ben Lomond Summit track to the left (your route) or the Moonlight Track/Arthur’s Point to your right – go left. There’s a chair not far on from here that affords great views of the mountains if you need a sit down.

9. Continue to follow the tramped route, which sees you climb steadily up before taking you around to make your final approach to the summit from the north-west. You made it!

10. Coming back off the summit, re-trace your route back to the saddle and continuing on the Ben Lomond Track towards Queenstown. You will eventually get yourself back to the track junction you first approached that sits about 300m on from the treeline. This time, take the left path which directs you towards the gondola station.

11. Following the signs to the gondola station is easy enough, and once you arrive you can stop for a pit-stop or keep making your journey back to town. From the station, follow the Skyline Access Rd down for 600m or so until you reach the signposted entrance to the Tiki Trail – this is the trail you’ll follow back to the finish.

12. The Tiki Trail signs guide you all the way back down the steep trails, following the orange tree markers where signs aren’t present. You’ll come to a few mountain bike track junctions along the way but the walking route is well marked. And you’re done!

Note that the track is in an alpine environment up high and can be difficult and often dangerous to navigate in winter conditions (snow and ice!). It always pays to check in at the DOC office in town to find out about track conditions before heading out, and if you can find a local to accompany you – even better!

POST RUN GOODNESS:

Queenstown is perhaps just as well prepared for post-run goodness as it is for the delights of running! For a coffee or quality diner-style breakfast, Joe’s Garage – hidden away on Searle Lane in the middle of town – serves a consistently good brew and hearty sized meals. If you’re chasing a post-run beer, it’s hard to overlook Pub on Wharf – located on Steamer Wharf in the heart of Queenstown – where you’re treated to an affordable-yet-quality menu, a dizzying array of beer choices (*Sassy Red* – thank us later), and you can sit outside and watch the world go by next to the lake. Hard to beat, really.