New Taupo Ultra run on Great Lakes trail

By TrailRunMag

A new ultrarunning event for Taupo will see runners making an uninterrupted traverse across the entire Great Lake Trail, including over private land.

The inaugural Taupo Ultramarathon event will run on 15 October, 2016, with four distances – 24km, 50km, 74km and 100km. The 24km option gives those new to the sport a taste of the ultra experience.

The event is set to add to Taupo’s stable of endurance events and will follow the highly popular Run Taupo series happening between July and September. Ultramarathon events are growing in popularity internationally, particularly those on trails.

Event founder and endurance athlete, Will Samuel says he has created the event to offer runners and walkers of all abilities an ultrarunning option on the famed trail.

“The Great Lake Trail is literally an epic journey that showcases the very best of what our region has to offer – New Zealand’s largest lake, mountain ranges, rivers, waterfalls and native forest.”

“It’s absolutely stunning and the new Taupo Ultramarathon offers a once-a-year opportunity where runners can access the Great Lake Trail uninterrupted, including access over private land.”

“We couldn’t do this without the support of land owners, trail builders, community organisations and many others and I’d particularly like to acknowledge their efforts which will make this event possible.”

Will says the event will run predominately on single trail, with some four wheel drive, farmland and road routes connecting the trails.

He says starts will be staggered along the course, with all events finishing at Whakaipo Bay.

“The 74km start is a particular highlight as it is only accessible by boat.”

Local company Total Sport will be involved with the event, and are excited by the proposition – says Aaron Carter, “the Taupo Ultramarathon is set to become one of NZ’s truly iconic and absolutely epic events. Great courses in an amazing region, and offering a number of options for a wide variety of people – bring it on!”

Event Ambassador and trail runner (and past TRM NZ Editor) Mal Law commends the new event.

“It’s great to see another Ultramarathon added to the New Zealand calendar, in such a great location and on stunning trails.”

Mal last year completed his incredible High Five-0 Challenge of climbing 50 peaks and running 50 marathons in 50 days, including Mt Ruapehu and Mt Ngauruhoe. He recently launched ‘FIFTY – the Movie’ which profiles the challenge and screens in Taupo on 5 April, 2015.

Entries are limited and will available online at www.taupoultra.com.

The first 100 entries before the end of February receive a special rate for those who want to guarantee their spot early. Solo runners can enter any of the four distances, with walk options over the 24km and 50km and team relay options available for the 50km.

www.facebook.com/taupoultramarathon/

It was you: a letter of trail origins

By TrailRunMag

Kiwi running legend, Mal Law, is about to undertake the most audacious feat of his life… the High Five-0 Challenge: fifty marathons, fifty mountains, fifty days. Before that it was the 7-in-7 and the Coastal Path Challenges with a bunch of other cause-related runs packed in between. On the eve of his biggest challenge to date – and biggest fundraising effort with almost $300K raised for Mental Health Foundation of NZ (MHF) – we thought we’d re-run a very personal piece he wrote for the magazine a while back, exploring the motivations that drive his obsession with trail running which can be traced back to his parents. Here, Mal writes a letter to his Dad in a conversation that sheds some light on the man and the passion. Check his mission out in real time at www.high50.org.nz. We wish Mal the best on the coming days, which will be huge, tough, but full of inspiration.

Dear Dad,

I should have written this letter to you long ago, but somehow I never got around to it. I so wish I had, because then you might actually have got to read it.

The doctors said it was pneumonia and maybe that’s what it was in medical terms. But in human terms we know it was a broken heart. Just a week earlier we had said goodbye to mum. Your job on this mortal coil was done. You had loved her for more than 60 years and cared for her so touchingly in her final months. There was nothing left for you to hang around for and so at the same time as being devastated by losing you we were pleased that you didn’t have to struggle on in a world devoid of purpose and meaning.

You were a man of your generation. You kept your emotions in check and didn’t outwardly express your love, yet I was never in any doubt about just how much you did love me. This rubbed off on me and until close to the end I hadn’t mustered the courage to say what should be the simplest thing to say to your own father – “I love you dad”. I’m so glad that I eventually did but I also wish I’d also told you how grateful I was to you for shaping the person I have become. That’s what this letter is about.

For today, Dad, I am a happy, fulfilled person who has found a passion that both defines my life and gives it meaning – trail running. I love everything about it. The physical and mental challenges that it provides, the amazing places that it takes me, the adventure that is inherent in every run, the massive reward I get from running for good causes, the people that I do it with and the wider community of friends and acquaintances that I feel so very much a part of. Trail runners are my tribe and I’m happy being one of them. That sounds almost trite but the sense of belonging and fulfillment that this fringe pursuit brings me is central to my concept of self worth. And without that we are nothing.

So how is it that you – a man I never ever saw running, except as a referee on a rugby field and a devilishly sly tennis player – had such a heavy influence on what I am today?

Perhaps the most obvious way that you rubbed off on me was through your own love of mountains and wild places. Some of my earliest, strongest and most poignant memories from my childhood are of rummaging around in cupboards at home amongst your hiking boots; ferreting in your steel-framed rucksack looking for leftover boiled sweets; the musty aroma of your anorak and waterproofs. I can almost smell the dubbin and the leather as I write this; the peaty smells that emanated from those clothes even months after your last trip to your beloved Scottish mountains.

It’s all so vivid and feels so connected with, responsible for, what I have become. Which makes it hard to believe that the few times you succeeded in getting me on to a mountain you did so with me kicking, screaming and moping, bribed by the promise of a measly square of fruit and nut chocolate if I made the summit.

Given my obstreperous attitude and seeming indifference to thick Scottish cloud, you’d have been surprised if you’d ever caught me doing something that I did regularly – sneaking glances at your mountain walking photo albums. But Dad, even without realizing it at the time, I think I always loved those boring black and white pictures of misty ridges, stark corries and dark rock walls. They left in indelible impression on me and with hindsight it was inevitable that I would one day be drawn back to such places, freely and of my own will, to experience the sheer unmitigated joy of pitting myself against gravity and bagging peaks. Thank you for planting that seed and sorry I wasn’t better company at the time.

I also recall you telling me stories about your adventures. Catching the night train from your RAF base in the south of England hundreds of miles north to disembark on the bleak expanse of Rannoch Moor so you could bag a few peaks before catching the train back the next day. Taking the mail boat from Mallaig into the wilds of Knoydart to knock off the most remote peaks in the British Isles. Hearing of your fear on scaling the Inaccessible Pinnacle in the Cuilin Range on the Isle of Skye. Each story seeped into me, crystallising into an unquenchable thirst for adventure that would surface many years later.

But it was more than just your passion for wild places that has shaped who I am today. You had a personal quest and after roaming all over the Highlands for some 30+ years you became one of the first people ever to summit all 650 or so 3,000ft-high Scottish ‘Tops’. I never told you at the time but I was so proud of you and I loved the look of total incomprehension in the eyes of friends when I attempted to explain to them what you had achieved. I’m sure this is one reason why I am such a goal-oriented person, and why I love attempting things that are beyond the comprehension of many.

So through you I discovered mountains and I discovered hiking. I started bagging the Scottish peaks myself and found adventure and solace in those high places. Then I moved to New Zealand and my love of the outdoors was magnified by the wildness of our landscapes here. I took to multi-day tramping trips like a duck to water and this eventually led me to trail running. It may seem like a circuitous route to finding my true calling but I know I would never have arrived here at my ‘happy place’ without your quiet unassuming influence. Thanks dad.

But all this was just the start. I was trail running for many years before I really started to think of it as a defining part of who I am. Before I became obsessed. The tipping point came when I decided (ironically enough during a long solo multi-day hike) to attempt running the 7 mainland Great Walks in 7 Days. What was to become the 7in7 Challenge. This as you know was my way of belatedly dealing with the event that forty years earlier had shattered us all – the death of your other son, my brother Alan. I wanted to honour his memory and I wanted to raise money for families that were facing the same battles that we had to face when Alan was sick with leukaemia.

But I also wanted to do something that would make you proud of me. Crazy I know that at the age of 49 I was still looking for that, but there you go. As it turned out, when I told you of my plan you simply said: “You’re off your rocker, that can’t be done!” I know you were simply worried for me (or at least about my knees), but I have to tell you that did rather stoke my fire and make me even more determined to succeed. So once again you were highly influential in creating what has now become my true passion – using trail running to benefit great causes.

So much for the past. What of the future? Dad, I so wish you were still here to share in the next great adventure planned. This one is special because I’m coming ‘home’ to do it. I wanted to tell you about this when the idea first hit me but it was just days before Mum’s funeral service, you were sick, and the time seemed wrong.

Do you remember that Sal and I took off to Cornwall for a couple of days, under orders from Hilary and Jacky (the Sisters That Must Be Obeyed), to have a couple of days to ourselves? Well, the first morning we were there I awoke very early. It was pitch black and freezing outside but I needed a run to clear my head and make sense of mum’s death. So I took off on the South West Coast Path along a section that I knew you and mum had walked and loved. The frigid air chilled my bones but gave me a sense of alertness that I’d lacked for days since stepping off the hastily booked flight from Auckland.

For the first hour I could only see what my head torch illuminated but gradually dawn seeped through the sky and struggled in vain to warm this stark morning landscape of huge cliffs and wild seas. I could see you and Mum walking hand in hand along the cliff path and I cried as I ran, trying to find the right words for my eulogy to Mum. This is when I knew that I wanted to run the entire 1014 km length of this fierce but beautiful trail. It just seemed so right and it became even more so when just a week or so later you too passed away.

[Mal did end up running the length of the South West Coastal Path, having teamed up with runner Tom Bland]

Yes, I know you would have appreciated the irony of this and most likely would have come up with some fitting pun to make light of the situation. You’d have tutted, shaken your head and asked “Why?” But I can’t help but feel that deep down you’d have been very proud, just as I know you were when I completed my 7in7 Challenges.

From the Mountain

By George Sterling (1869-1926)

Let us go home with the sunset on our faces:
We that went forth at morn,
To follow on the wind’s auroral paces,
And find the desert bourn
The frontier of our hope and Heaven’s scorn.

Let us go home with the sunset on our faces:
We that have wandered far
And stood by noon in high, disastrous places,
And known what mountains are
Between those eyries and the morning star.

Let us go home with the sunset on our faces:
Although we have not found
The pathway to the inviolable spaces,
We see from holy ground
An ocean far below without a sound.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

ED’S NOTE: As Mal does, we here at Trail Run Mag have a great belief in the power of being active in the outdoors – including trail running – to help heal and manage mental health issues. So we encourage anyone who can, to donate to the cause through Mal’s website or the Mental Health charity he’s raising funds for. Or, we encourage anyone experiencing mental health issues to reach out, contacting a mental health assistance organisation wherever you are, and maybe even hook up with one of the many social trail running groups out there – friendly bunches one and all, welcoming of newcomers and great to connect with.

www.mentalhealth.org.nz
www.high50.org.nz/
www.beyondblue.org.au

Here comes Kepler: a trail challenge

By TrailRunMag

Of tough men, long skirts and bronze shoes…

A fixture on the New Zealand trail running calendar for 27 years, now, the inaugural Kepler Challenge (planned to be a one-off) was originally organised to honour a Fiordland outdoor legend.

In 1988, the Te Anau community was looking for a way to commemorate the centenary of the re-discovery of Milford Track by Quinton MacKinnon (re-discovery as it is thought that a similar route had previously been used by Maori to gather greenstone from Milford Sound). At a public meeting it was decided that funds be raised and a statue be erected to honour Quintin MacKinnon.

MacKinnon’s discovery made it possible for people to walk relatively easily and safely through the lofty Fiordland mountains to Milford Sound via the famous Milford Track, later proclaimed to be the “finest walk in the world”. Only a few years after his discovery, MacKinnon started guiding people on the Milford Track. A surprising number of men and women completed this trip in those pre-Gore-Tex times of ties, hats and long skirts. Access to Milford by road only became possible in 1953 when the Homer Tunnel was completed.

MacKinnon’s venture was the beginning of the tourism activity in this area, today worth millions of dollars, and as somebody’s put it; “until the rediscovery of MacKinnon Pass, Te Anau slumbered on the edge of the unknown…” MacKinnon himself unfortunately went missing, presumably drowned, on Lake Te Anau in 1892.

Amongst many other fundraising events the (then) Fiordland Athletic Club decided to organise a race on Milford Track, which proved too much of a logistics nightmare. Instead they turned their attention to the Kepler Track, which was being built to relieve the pressure on the two Great Walks in the area; the Milford and the Routeburn Track. The Kepler Challenge name was chosen to express the fact that this was to be a race/challenge for all, not just the professionals and semi-professionals.

The race was run on 17 December 1988 with 149 runners competing. By then the Kepler Track was completed apart from 3km above the Luxmore Hut, which meant part of the course was run through virgin tussock. It was meant to be a one-off fundraiser but the response to it was such that the committee decided to continue to hold it and it has been run every year since then – it is now firmly established as the premier mountain running event in New Zealand. A shorter, gut-busting “sister” race was established later: the Luxmore Grunt is a 27km run up to Luxmore Hut and down again.

The first male and female runner to reach the Luxmore hut, earn a special prize, the title of the “King and Queen of the Mountain”. The veteran runners say that in the men’s field the King of the Mountain never goes on to win the Kepler Challenge…

The race trophy, a bronze running shoe, is a cast of the type of shoe used by Russell Prince, the winner of the first race.

In previous years the field, 450 in the Kepler Challenge, 150 in the Luxmore Grunt, has filled within a week of the entries opening in mid-winter. In 2006 the registrations went online for the first time and now the field fills in just minutes, demonstrating the popularity of the Kepler Challenge in New Zealand and abroad. The first race was also a successful fundraiser and today visitors are greeted by a lakefront statue of Quinton MacKinnon, gazing upon his beloved Lake Te Anau. Following in this vein, several people who complete the Challenge in recent years have done so as a means to fundraise for worthy causes.

EDITOR’S NOTE: courtesy of the Kepler Challenge organisers, Trail Run Mag is proud to be represented this year by Shaun Brewster and Chris O’Driscoll, from Brewsters Running, who will experience the event from an on trail perspective an report back via a feature in the coming edition #15 of the magazine. Stay tuned…(go lads!)

Current Race Records

Kepler Challenge (60km)
4.33.37 – Martin Dent (2013)
5:23:34 – Zelah Morrall (2003)

Luxmore Grunt (27km)
1:52:30 Phil Costley (2008)
2:04:18 – Shireen Crumpton (1998)

Names to watch in 2014

MEN

Martin Dent – Aus – 35 – from Canberra, Australia has been a competitor in the 2012 Olympic Games (marathon) and has represented Australia in three Commonwealth Games. Martin won the 2013 ASICS Kepler Challenge in a record-breaking time of 4.33.37

Vajin Armstrong – NZ – was the winner of three Kepler Challenges (2010, 2011, and 2012) and second place-getter in 2013.

Mark Green – NZ – 41- placed 5^th in the 2013 ASICS Kepler Challenge.

Grant Guise – 4^th in 2010, 5^th in 2011, 6^th in 2013 in the Kepler Challenge,

Scott Hawker – NZ – 27 – placed 5^th in the Hong Kong 100km, 5^th in Tarawera Ultra, 1^st in Mt Solitary Ultra, 7^th in North Face Ultra.

Stafford Thompson – NZ – 34- came 1^st Coastal Classic 2013, 1^st Hanmer Alps Marathon 2013, 1^st Motatapu Marathon 2014.

Mick Donges – AUS – 31- has been running ultra-marathons for five years. He has been placed twice in the Tarawera Ultra-Marathon.

Peter Tuck – NZ – 45 – has a marathon PB of 2.42. He had a cycling accident in 2012 and 2014 ASICS Kepler Challenge is his final stage of rehabilitation.

Glen Marvin – NZ – 41 – this is Glen’s 4th Kepler Challenge. He is raising funds and profile for the Mental Health Foundation in conjunction with Malcolm Law and the High Five Challenge. His personal goal to raise $10 000 towards total target of $250 000

Paul Timothy – Brit – 32 – 2^nd Croesus Mountain Trail Run (3.05)

Cameron Durno – NZ – 33- is an endurance sports coach and this is his 11^th Kepler Challenge.

Kevin Bruffy – USA – 30 – former university runner in the USA.

Timo Meyer – Ger – 36 – H.U.R.T. 100 mile (Hawaii USA) 2^nd overall, UTMF Japan 4^th

Tom Hunt – NZ – 26 – completed the Tarawera Ultra in 7.12 and was 2^nd in the Hilary 80km Ultra

Shane Thrower – NZ – 46 – Uncle of Scott Hawker

Matthew Dickinson – Brit – 29 – 2013 52 peaks in 52 weeks.

Michael Beaumont – NZ – 39- will run in his 7^th Kepler Challenge

Russell Hurring – NZ – 60 – from Dunedin, has encouraged his son and daughter-in-law to take part in the Luxmore Grunt this year. This is Russell’s 12^th Kepler Challenge.

Malcolm Law – NZ – 54 – of 7 in 7 fame. This is Malcolm’s 6^th Kepler Challenge and he says he just can’t stay away from this race.

WOMEN

Ruby Muir – NZ – 23 – was the 2012 and 2013 ASICS Kepler Challenge winner.

Jo Johansen – NZ – 34 – 1^st 2014 Tarawera Ultra, 1^st woman on the Hilary Trail, 1^st woman Hutt River Trail.

Jean Beaumont – NZ – 50 – from Prirua, Jean was 3^rd in 2013 ASICS Kepler Challenge. She has run seven Kepler Challenges and six 100 mile races.

Beth Cardelli – Aus – 34 – was named Australian ultra-marathon runner of the year for 2012 and 2013. She is three times winner of the North Face 100 in Australia.

Julie Quinn – NZ – is a successful kiwi ultra-runner in Australia. She has had two wins and two seconds in the North Face race in the Blue Mountains in Australia.

LUXMORE GRUNT

Richard Ford – NZ – 24 – this is Richard’s favourite race. Placed 4^th in 2010, 3^rd in 2011, 2^nd in 2012, 3^rd in 2013.

Luke Hurring – NZ – 30 – son of Russell Hurring. He has had lots of running experience on the track and road, but is new to long distance trail running.

Nathan Jones – NZ – 37 – from North Canterbury. Nathan ran the Luxmore Grunt in 2010 and 2011, and the Kepler Challenge in 2012 and 2013.

Alan Funnell – NZ – 46 – is the president of the Leith Valley Harrier Club in Dunedin and is the race director for the Three Peaks event. He has been running for thirteen years.

Martin McCrudden – NZ – 20 – from Wellington, Martin was first in the Crazyman Junior Duathalon.

Kelvin Meade – Brit – 35 – has run in similar events over the past four years

Patrick Williamson – NZ – 23 – from Wellington, has run in the Motatapu Miners’ Trail and the Shotover half-marathon.

Andrew Fraser – NZ – 49 – from Cambridge, was the 2^nd veteran in the Coast to Coast and 2^nd veteran in the Routeburn Classic.

Riki Russell – NZ – 26 – from Riverton ran last year’s Luxmore Grunt in 2.38.40

Jeff Walker – NZ – 50 – from Cromwell, has run several Coast to Coast events, three iron distances and one Luxmore Grunt.

Morgan Denny – NZ – 28 – from Bluff, was 5^th in 2013 Luxmore Grunt

Rod Albert – Mex – 38 – this is Rod’s first mountain event after competing in several half-marathons.

Mark Geddes – NZ – 38 – from Dunedin, has been running for many years, including half-marathons and cross country races.

Rikki Griffin – NZ – 36 – from Te Anau, Rikki is usually a cyclist/multi-sport competitor.

Women

Louisa Andrew – NZ – from Dunedin, won last year’s Luxmore Grunt and has completed the Melbourne marathon and ten half-marathons

Christina Taylor – NZ – 22 – has been competing in track and cross country for ten years.

Kellie Hurring – NZ – 31 – from Auckland, Kellie’s father-in-law, Russell, has encouraged the family to take up the challenge. In the past, Kellie has held national titles in 800m, 1500m, 5000m and 10 000m.

www.keplerchallenge.co.nz

Editorial: Life bender

By TrailRunMag

Vicki Woolley, NZ editor’s column from the latest edition of Trail Run Mag.

The other day I picked up a crappy cheap canvas board from The Warehouse, plain black with blue writing: “ONE DAY CAN BEND YOUR LIFE”. It’s not hanging on the wall yet, oddly, I move it around the house every few days. Even now as I glance at it propped up against my computer table, I am simultaneously empowered and humbled.

The course of my life bent dramatically two months ago when Malcolm Law published the story of my battle with mental health issues on the Partners Life High50 Challenge blog page. Within four minutes of it going online, Facebook Messenger began pinging crazily and at the same time, texts came flooding in. Not the sugary messages of sympathy I was dreading, thank god, but empathy for our shared experience. My people – our people – pouring out their own tales of abuse, neglect, obsession, addiction and ultimately – anxiety, depression… finally suicide. Words gushing out, crowding each other on the page, needing to be said, desperate to be heard. So much pain. So many tears. So wrong.

I had always suspected that borderline mental health disorders were over-represented in the trail and ultra running communities, but until Malcolm and Sally Law created a safe platform for the conversations to start, I had not realised how rampant dis-ease in our community is. And I can’t help but suspect it is no accident that so many of us have stumbled into trail running as a strategy for our emotional survival: trail running gives us a huge raft of benefits, possibly more than any other single sport I can think of. Obviously flooding our system with endorphins and adrenaline is a double bonus in that it reduces negativity AND gives us that indomitable ‘runners high’. The physical benefits are obvious: feel strong, feel fit, look good, feel good. Running in wild and beautiful places feeds our souls, our sense of adventure, achievement: it is impossible not to have your spirit touched when running beside thundering West Coast surf, climbing an exposed rocky ridgeline, or cruising silently through a stand of majestic ancient Kauri. And trail running has become a social sport, a way of connecting with like-minded souls.

And now we are at the crux of things. Connecting. Connection. We wonder often – individually and in groups – about the unusual nature of bonds formed on trail. We bond quickly and we bond deeply. Is it because trail runners have a unique interest that is common to all – we love the outdoors? Is it because the boundaries of competition are less clearly delineated than that of flat, fast road running: speed over terrain is subject to so many more variables; gender differences are narrower and vary over distance? Is it because you must have a sense of humility if you run trail – at some point in the game you ARE going to end up face down in mud or gorse with your butt stuck in the air while your mates roar with laughter? Is it because a great number of us run trail to quiet the noise in our heads – and we get that about our companions? Is it a combination of all these, and more?

Whatever: the point is that as we connect on trail, we talk about stuff that matters to us: sport, politics and religion, a shitty week at work, difficult kids and troublesome partners. It’s just a little step further to be more open about ourselves: the things we are struggling with, the areas we need help. Mal, Sal and the Partners High50 Challenge have cracked the door. It’s up to us to start the conversation.

Your thankfully connected editor, Vicki Woolley, NZ

THIS EDITORIAL is from Edition 14 of Trail Run Mag, now on the digital stands, downloadable for FREE or on subscription via iPad and Kindle. See www.trailrunmag.com/magazines to get your copy now.

Dirty kilometres: who’s counting?

By TrailRunMag

Trail Run Mag’s New Zealand Editor, Mal Law, signs off on his last edition as chief honcho with bigger projects about to be crammed into his running schedule. We’ll keep Mal on (if he’ll let us) as an Editor-At-Large, which simply means he’ll contribute as and when he can and tell us when we need to pull up our socks on New Zealand-based content. In the meantime, his editorial asks the question…who’s counting? (He is and he’s not gonna apologise).

Remember the days before we all (ok, most of us) had GPS watches? When a run in the bush was accompanied only by bird call, trickling water and the steady thud thud of our non-minimalist (why did we never call them maximalist?) shoes? It seems an inconceivably long time ago when I trawl through hundreds of Garmin Connect Activities on my laptop, yet it’s only a few short years back.

The advent of the GPS watch and the possibility it creates for all kinds of geeky logging and analysis raises an interesting question. Has it enhanced or eroded the sport trail running? Are we now too fixated on the numbers and becoming oblivious to the pure essence of trail running that got us hooked in the first place?

At the start of this year I was feeling a little low on motivation and without any huge new goals to set my sights on I decided to declare 2013 to be the Year of the Streak. I would attempt to run every day for a year, no rest days allowed. I also set a target of running 5,000 kms during the year and so have been tracking my progress using my Garmin.

At the end of January I posted my progress on Facebook and was rather taken aback when someone commented that because I was counting kilometres I was corrupting the spirit of the sport.

“What happened to just going for a trail run for the love of it?” was the rather provocative remark that got me stirred up and yes, thinking about whether or not I was in any way stepping away from the essence of the sport I love.

Having had time to reflect on this I can now emphatically answer that question – NO I’m not. The joy of the trail and the reasons I do it are the same as they’ve always been. The simple act of running on beautiful tracks with great mates is still feeds my soul and replenishes my spirit. The fact that I’m counting kilometres as I go has in no way taken away from the enjoyment. In fact, if anything, it has provided me with the motivation to get out there more, experience more, discover more and further cement my addiction to what for me is a massively rewarding pastime.

GPS technology is there to be used if you want to, for whatever reason you want to use it. And if you’re not interested in using it then that’s fine too. Each to their own I say – and if that’s not true to the utopian spirit of trail running then I don’t know what is.

Happy trails everyone – whether you count the kilometres or not.

Your streaking NZ Editor, Mal Law

AU ED’S NOTE: Quite simply, without Mal Law, Trail Run Mag would not exist and for all his efforts, time and sweat, we’d like to thank the man, the legend, the runner, the writer for everything he has contributed to the title over the past two years. It’s been a slow build by passionate people and none more passionate than Mal. Most of you who read Trail Run Mag will also know of Mal through his trail running endeavors and we can promise you that there will be plenty more by this man. We encourage everyone to follow Mal on his continuing singletrack journey.

On FB via Running Wild: www.facebook.com/runningwildnz
Via Running Wild website: www.runningwildnz.com
And of course buy his brilliant book* ‘One Step Beyond’ HERE.
(*We’ll run a chapter excerpt in the next edition to entice those who haven’t already bought it to do so: an investment in inspiration)

The team at Trail Run Mag would like to thank Mal profusely for being Mal: passionate, dedicated and a true runner in that he runs with his heart and thankfully for us, also writes with it. We hope he’ll continue to grace the pages of Trail Run Mag with his adventures and thoughts on the world of trail running. Thanks Mal. Beer’s on us. Always.

REMEMBER: nThe latest edition of Trail Run Mag has landed! And it’s free for all you dirt-loving trailites to get an eyeful of the best singletrack tales, mountain madness and back of beyond running you can imagine.

Download your FREE COPY here (right click, save to desktop or go here).