Table of contents for February - April 2021 in Trail Run

You’ve got to love a trail run that starts with the crack of a stockman’s whip. The Snowies Trail Run Festival is alpine wilderness at its best. Starting from Lake Crackenback Resort and Spa, the course traverses the stunning Thredbo Valley, which undulates alongside Thredbo River within Australia’s iconic Kosciuszko National Park. It’s challenging, remote and wild, but with four distances to choose from (50km, 21km, 11km and 5km) and a 500m Kids Mud Rats Run, there’s something for hardcore trailites and beginners alike. The 50km ultra (actually 48.5km, with an elevation gain/loss of 1306m/-1091m) begins with 17km along the Lower Thredbo Valley Trail, featuring rugged mountain terrain, technical single track, challenging ascents and adrenaline-pumping downhill. Starting at an altitude of 1260m at the Gaden Trout Hatchery, runners cross a…

‘IT’S A LIFE-CHANGING PROGRAM. IT’S TOUGH, BUT NOTHING WORTH HAVING IN LIFE COMES EASILY.’ New York City Marathon, 2018. The start-line crowd was overwhelming. Indigenous Australian runner Rachael Howard’s anxiety was in overdrive. The 28-year-old longed her for family back in Maitland, New South Wales. Stomach in knots, she shed a few tears. Then, it was time to move. Rachael’s coach ran with her for the first couple of kilometres, helping her navigate the 50,000-plus throng of runners. Eventually, she got some breathing space. Her coach left her side, and she pounded through the city’s five boroughs – Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx and Manhattan – without him. But she wasn’t alone. “I remember getting to about 30km and I was really hurting,” Rachael says. “I took my phone…

‘I HAVE LEARNT A LOT WITH THIS LAST INJURY. THERE'S MORE PARTS TO ME THAN JUST BEING THE RUNNER LUCY.’ As it was for all of us, 2020 was a year of ups and downs for Lucy Bartholomew, Australia’s much-adored champion of the trail and ultra-running scene. Racing plans were upended as travel was restricted and events cancelled or postponed. But Lucy kept it real. That’s one thing her legion of fans loves about her. She’s open about the highs and lows of training and being in the spotlight from such a young age. The gun runner (she smashed her fist 100km race when she was just 15, and in 2018 was third female at Western States 100) is honest about her struggles on social media, yet always defaults to…

If I could work my life out so that I only ever ran on glorious rainforest trails, I would be a happy runner indeed. Sadly, I have not yet worked my life out to be so! Roads and pavement feature in my weekly running schedule, so it’s great to have a pair of runners you can wear comfortably on the trails and pavement. This is where Hoka One One’s Challenger ATR 6 comes to the fore. This sixth iteration of the Challenger is a versatile and adaptable hybrid shoe, handling many trail types and bitumen with ease. This is super handy if, like me, you need to run on some road to hit your local trails. I must confess, I popped my Hoka One One cherry with the Challenger ATR…

I RAN MY FIRST HALF MARATHON AT THE AGE OF SIX.As a child, I belonged to both athletics clubs and the local joggers club. My father and I used to run every weekend with the local joggers. As a young kid, I was involved in swimming and competed nationally, then moved into cycling at a national level. During high school, my PE teacher encouraged me to do a duathlon (run, bike, run). I ended up winning the National School Championships, which earned me a spot on the New Zealand Development Triathlon Team. I spent my teenage and early adult years as a triathlete, competing at world championships in Olympic, 70.3 and Ironman distance races. In my 20s, I lived in Europe and raced in Ironman triathlons in the professional category…

So, you think you’re a bit of a mountain goat? Ain’t no mountain high enough? Well, why not put those vertical-loving legs of yours to the ultimate test at the Mt Oxford Odyssey! There are four races to choose from, but it’s the marathon – touted as New Zealand’s toughest – that will really push you to your physical and mental limits. The Salewa Mountain Marathon has more vertical gain than any other marathon in NZ – 3,500m of it. That’s close to Mt Cook’s height broken up into three different ascents and descents. Oh, and there may be some snow. And ice. But don’t worry, the race directors won’t alter the course … unless there’s a blizzard. Sound like fun? If so, you might just be the kind of…

You know anything with the word “monster” in the title is going to be seriously epic, and the West Macs Monster Trail Running Festival is exactly that. Set in the rugged West MacDonnell (Tjoritja) Ranges in the Red Centre of the Northern Territory, the West Macs Monster is as spectacular as it is intimidating, and will test everything you’ve got. The main event is the 231km Sonder Monster: a formidable end-to-end race on the iconic Larapinta Trail. With a 60-hour cut off, only a handful of people have attempted and succeeded at completing the full distance. The event kicks off at Redbank Gorge with a brutal climb of 8km with 740m elevation. Reaching the top of Mount Sonder is worth it, though, for the jaw-dropping 360-degree panoramic views. From there,…

If you haven’t watched the 11-minute short film, The Mirnavator, I suggest you do so right now. The opening is shocking. Not because of any graphic imagery, but because of the cutting statements Mirna Valerio reads from an email she received while she was running a 50km ultramarathon. “You are a liar and a fraud. You are not a runner … You are moving no faster than what I can walk. You expect people to actually be stupid enough to believe this (bleep). A true professional runner is not overweight, which you are. A person who runs marathons for a living is not overweight, which is what you are. F*** you.” It’s hard to fathom the motivations behind such hurtful words, let alone the strength it must have taken for…

“The face of the earth is changing so that soon there will be little of the primitive nature left. In the Old World, it is practically gone forever. Here, then, is Stewart Island’s prime advantage, and one hard to overestimate. It is an actual piece of the primeval world.”– Leonard Cockayne, 1909 Stewart Island is pure adventure. Its Māori name, Rakiura, means “land of the glowing skies”. Even getting to the island, which is New Zealand’s third-largest island and 30km south of the South Island, is an adventure! The only way to get there is by ferry from Bluff or by plane from Invercargill. Of course, I chose to take the ferry from Bluff. With winds reaching 35 knots, the ride was not for the faint hearted. In travel books,…

Mick Chapman and Reece Evans had their heads down, uploading their runs to Strava. They had just completed day three of their self-made 7in7 challenge – an audacious mission to run seven of New South Wales’ most iconic trails in seven consecutive days. Sitting in the car, after conquering Mount Gulaga (12.4km and 867m elevation), they felt satisfied and eager to see what the next four days would bring. Hopefully, better weather. Suddenly, their driver made an odd sound. Mick and Reece looked up from their phones to see a car skidding towards them sideways on the wet, windy road. A split second later, the car – driven by a young P-plater – slammed into theirs. “Reece and I were both on the side of the car that was hit,”…

In July 2020, beast ultra runner Damian Hall set the fastest known time on the 268-mile Pennine Way in an incredible 61 hours, 34 minutes. He beat the previous record on this brutal trail (Great Britain’s oldest National Trail), held by John Kelly, by more than three hours. What makes Hall’s feat even more remarkable is that he cleared the trail of litter at the same time. What a champ! And what shoes was he wearing? Inov-8’s Terraultra G 270. Now, wearing the G 270s doesn’t mean I’m suddenly going to become Damian Hall Mark 2, but hey, I can dream! The Terraultra G 260 was a huge hit for inov-8. It was a low-stack, tough yet flexible trail shoe that offered a nice amount of ground feel without being…

Discarded fishing nets are a scourge of the ocean, deadly to sea life and accounting for around half of the ocean’s plastic pollution. Patagonia has teamed with start-up company Bureo to develop NetPlus™ – a 100% recycled, traceable material made from these washed-up nets. The result? A neat and innovative range of caps and truckers. I never run without a hat. It’s sun smart, but also, I wear glasses, and a hat helps keep the spec arms in place to stop them from bouncing around! I usually find a visor works best for this, but these caps did the job just as well. Patagonia’s range of NetPlus™ hats and caps is vast, with the NetPlus™ material used for the brim stiffeners. I tried three products in the range: the Airshed…

Dead Cow Gully is a sprawling 1,600-acre cattle property 11km north of Nanango, a country town in the South Burnett region of Queensland. It was named after a poor beast that lost its footing by the creek’s edge, only to be discovered a week later tangled in tree roots … two metres above the creek bed. Runners now have the chance to follow the hoofsteps of this cow (not literally – that would be bad) at the inaugural Dead Cow Gully Backyard Ultra. Race director Timothy Walsh has eked out a 6.7km looped course on the Dead Cow Gully property, which his family has owned for 150 years. Runners test their endurance by running as many loops as they can (one loop on the hour, every hour) until the last…

Established in 1990, the Tararua Mountain Race is one of New Zealand’s oldest mountain races. With 2,300m of ascent a over 34.5km, it’s seriously tough! But, in the words of the event organisers, it is a “benevolent challenge” – an escape from the cafes of Lambton Quay, Wellington, and an adventure in the thunderous mountain range of the Tararuas, which rise from the Tasman Sea and cascade into the Wairarapa. Game on! Run by a volunteer trust, the point-to-point Tararua Mountain Race is a unique opportunity for mountain runners to compete on some of the country’s most iconic routes. This year, the Tararua Mountain Race will cover the Kaitoke – Holdsworth tramping route (an alternative to the event’s mighty Southern Crossing route, which had been slated for 2021, but a…

The final months of 2019 were dark and filled with smoke in the Scenic Rim of Queensland. The acrid air sat at the back of people’s throats as wildfires swept through the mountain ranges that encircle my home, the small rural town of Boonah, population 2,500. Our usual peaceful outlook towards the peaks of Mount French, Mount Maroon and Mount Barney had become obliterated by smoke. I remember some mornings walking my daughter to school, only being able to see metres ahead of us. It felt like a bomb had just gone off. The local showgrounds became a base for the emergency services. My typically sleepy street raged with the comings and goings of fire crews, Salvation Army volunteers and helicopters. It was a frightening time not only for us…

Pain is the dogged companion of an ultra runner. Run for long enough, and it slinks out of the bushes eventually. We can try to push it away, ignore it, bargain with it, wrestle it, even hold its hand as we push into deeper dark. It waxes and wanes, but pain is always there, urging us on, making the finish line taste that much sweeter. We relish the pain, knowing it will (usually) end. Imagine experiencing a physical pain so great, so persistent, that you would do anything you could to stop it. It’s a pain that does not come with the high of a long run or medal at the end. It is all-encompassing, affecting your everyday life. It crushes you. In your pursuit to end the pain, you…

What is it about turning 40 that is so scary? It’s only a number. With age comes wisdom and experience, so perhaps it is something we should look forward to rather than dread. I think for me, the biggest issue with turning 40 was that it invoked a fear I was going to get slower at running. I had been running competitively since the age of eight, going through numerous phases of taking it very seriously, interspersed with periods of running purely for health and enjoyment. Running was, and still is, a big part of who I am. It helps keep me sane, and gives my goal-focused brain some structure and something objective to measure myself by. Running wasn’t my only focus in life. I had a busy life already…