When I first heard about the “Coast to Kosciuszko” run from some friends who suggested it to me, I thought it sounded totally crazy……a 240+km nonstop run that goes from sea level (ie the Coast) to the top of the highest mountain in Australia (ie Kosciuszko) that takes up the best part of a weekend….and then some.
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| The title of the event says it all.... |
I was gradually talked round into putting in an entry for consideration of a place…..they usually have over 100 applicants and only offer 50 places so all entries have to be vetted with qualifying runs etc. When I didn’t hear anything further about it, I presumed that I hadn’t been successful and so put it out of my mind. As it turned out, the organisers delayed their selection process but had decided not to bother letting potential runners know anything about that, as they expected everyone to follow their Instagram feed or something ((!!!!)).
A month later, friends who are on appropriate social media let me know that I was one of the lucky few that had been selected…..though I still remained far from convinced that it was really a run I wanted (or should) do, considering the discovery of my worsening bone problems. When someone told me that most people would jump at the opportunity and I may never have the chance again….and I learned that one guy walks almost all of the course and still makes the cutoffs (just) I thought I might as well give it a go….though I fully recognised that I wouldn’t be happy with myself if I walked it.
I’m not quite sure where the entry fee goes as there is no support provided en route, and so each runner has to persuade some of their lovely friends to give up a few days of their lives and come along and crew. Having not been in the country for that long, I found it hard to ask people to support me, so was very thankful when I few friends offered totally off their own bat, and eagerly took them up on their offers.
I ended up with a crew of 4 - Michael and Geordie (both of whom I have met through running since arriving here) drove down to the start line at Eden with me on the Thursday, whilst Julian (who has lived here for many years, but I knew through the bridge club in Cambridge way back when) & Jenna (his girlfriend who had just flown in to visit from NZ for the first time since the start of the year……what a romantic reunion….crewing a hot sweaty tired runner!!) came down on the Friday to sub in partway along the road as they both had to work on the Thursday.
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| My crew with the Kosci beers I gave them (Geordie, Michael, Julian and Jenna) |
Unfortunately the evening meal and race briefing for runners and their crew was cancelled and so after a non event of a number pickup, we were left to our own devices for the evening…..which for me consisted of eating pasta, getting my food, drink and mandatory kit sorted for the morning and then turning my phone off before chilling out with Geordie and Michael over a few glasses of wine.
I needn’t have set an early morning alarm as the team staying in the cabin opposite us turned their car headlights on at 4am - and as they were directed right at the head of my bed, there was no danger of me staying asleep - so I had ample time for my coffee and porridge before we drove down to the start on Boydtown Beach at Twofold Bay.
We had to check on the beach prior to 5am and then there were some random photo opportunities and pre-race speeches (naughtily enough, my friend Katy and I used the speech time to have a good catchup). All too soon it was 5:30 and we were setting off. It was funny to see some people try to sprint up the soft sand and onto the trail leading back to the main road…..I set off at a walk but started jogging shortly afterwards. Having crossed the main road, everyone (even the leaders) ceased any pretence of running as we had to scramble up a slope so steep that hands were needed in places!
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| On the beach :-) |
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| With Geordie and Michael before setting off |
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| Starting on the sand.... |
The next stretch was a relatively long gradual climb uphill on a dirt road and although I started this section with one guy…..telling him all about the history of who both Kosciuszko and Strzelecki were….my steady uphill pace meant that I was soon running alone, though I did pass a few more guys along the way, so had brief chats. I’m never the best at running down hills, and hadn’t quite expected so many (steep) descents……but because I was chatting away to a fellow Scot (who now lives in Queensland), I realised that I’d run way too fast and my quads would certainly not thank me for it later!!!
I did really enjoy this section of the run as it was still cool in the early morning, and we were running up and down small inclines winding around through beautiful wooded areas with the sun gradually climbing up into the sky…..perfect….so although it was nice to chat to various people, I also enjoyed the peace and tranquility when running along on my own.
I saw Geordie out in the road looking for me as I ran into Towamba, and he asked what I needed and grabbed it from Michael to hand on to me as I passed. He was allowed to run about 50m with me to find out how I was and what I’d like and when….but I was very aware of him not running more than this as the road was flanked by everyone’s support crews as this was the first point that we were all allowed to rendezvous. I was more than slightly jealous of the onlookers and supporters as they were all eating bacon and egg rolls whilst supping on coffees that were for sale at the local village hall…..whereas all I got was my prepared bottles and snacks that I knew I could eat whilst running….not quite so appealing!
I saw the guys a few times after that….and after a few misunderstandings about which bottles I wanted when I asked for a specific one (I had different coloured bottles containing plain water or made up powder) we got pretty slick at Geordie handing me a bottle at the side of the road and then me placing it into Michael’s outstretched hand as he drove the car past me and further up the road (though when they handed me food, they got nothing back in return!!). I remember running past other runner’s crew and they asked me why I had such a big grin on my face……and I replied that it was “all about the cake” as I’d started eating my way through my banana bread by then and waved a piece in the air to show them!!
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| The loneliness of the long-distance runner |
Without really realising it, I’d somehow moved into second place in the ladies’ race and some of my Trotter club mates (there to support other runners) told me that I wasn’t actually that far behind the leading lady. I was shocked at this as I knew her credentials and expected her to be way off in the distance….but then again, we had really only just started!! I was worried that I’d totally overcooked it already as although I felt comfortable, I went through the marathon distance in just over 3.5 hours and I was definitely starting to feel the heat of the day. The boys were great at reacting to this, handing me a change of top when I wanted to change into a lighter vest, and stopping more frequently to give me water, which I started pouring over myself as well as drinking (hence why we had to make sure when I was getting water and when electrolytes!!).
The first “mandatory checkpoint” was at Rocky Hall, which was about 50K into the run. Although described as a mandatory checkpoint, the “checking in” simply consisted of your crew texting the time that you ran through it to the race organisers…..which wasn’t exactly easy given there was no phone signal on a lot of the course. I actually couldn’t see the boys when I came into Rocky Hall and so presumed that they had gone slightly further up the road to wait for me there. I was a tad unimpressed by this as I was hot, hungry and thirsty and very envious when I saw Amy (the leading lady) being handed pieces of watermelon. I waved to another Trotter there supporting a friend of his, and so he then filmed me running past him and sent the footage back to the Trotters on the Central Coast!
I spent the next wee while desperately seeking out the boys’ car and was rather surprised when they drove up behind me. It turned out that they had been at Rocky Hall but had been parked behind someone else (hence me not spotting them) and hadn’t been expecting me that soon so had had their heads buried in the boot of the car sorting things out and missed me running past. When they saw people that had been quite a long way behind me running through, they asked one of them if they’d seen me….and then realised that I must be long gone…..and so chased me up the road!
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| Definitely starting to heat up..... |
It wasn’t far from where they found me to the start of “Big Jack”. This is a climb of almost 7k at an average gradient of 7.7% so with the best will in the world, I wasn’t going to be running up it. The gravel road is very narrow and twists up the hill through trees, so support vehicles were not allowed to stop anywhere…..hence each runner was allowed to be accompanied by one member for their support crew who could “mule” for them. Michael drew the short straw of coming with me (though I think he actually volunteered for the role) whilst Geordie had to drive up in one of the official car convoys (of which I wasn’t a fan as the cars waited haphazardly in the road at the bottom of the hill forcing me to weave around them all!).
I ran tiny segments but mainly walked and used the break to eat some proper food (ie sandwiches and wraps I’d made earlier) and get a decent amount of drink into me. I have never used poles when running (or walking) but I did have some pole envy as Amy and her “mule” powered past me with her using hers very effectively (she seemed to run/walk with ease up the steep incline, whereas my legs were protesting rather loudly!). When another car convoy came past, I got some encouragement from Damon, another Kirribilli Runner I know who was there supporting a good friend of his, but my only response was to tell him how much I was craving a good ice cream (we had been told that the forecast was for 20 degrees and overcast skies, but it got up to 38 degrees and there was hardly a cloud in the sky!!!).
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| The tarmac resumed at the top of Big Jack |
Geordie was going to come down the hill to join us, but he wasn’t allowed to do so, but he was there at the top with some sunscreen for me to try to apply to my neck and arms as I ran past. Michael had to stop at the top of the hill and so I was back on my own again…..literally….as Amy was miles out of sight ahead of me and there was no-one close behind. When I passed Damon’s car he asked if I had been serious about the ice cream as he had some Super Doopers in the car…..I would have fallen down at his knees for one, but luckily that wasn’t necessary (as I doubt that I would have been able to get up again) as he kindly gave one to Geordie to pass onto me….and it was as amazing as I’d thought it would be.
The run into Cathcart wasn’t much fun as it was along the side of a road into a strong headwind, but an added bonus of having slightly closed down a gap on a runner in front was that his support crew donated me the ice cream they’d bought him at the Cathcart shop, but that he’d refused!! I was due to have a crew changeover with Julian and Jenna joining us at Cathcart, but unfortunately I think I got there abut an hour earlier than we’d expected so luckily Geordie and Michael were happy (!) to carry on with me. I was rather glad of this as we’d established a good routine of them giving me water and snacks (with extra water to wet my hat/pour over my head) at regular intervals, and then me handing empties back into their outstretched hands as they drove past shortly afterwards.
I really needed that support at this point in time, as I wasn’t exactly in my “happy place” If anyone had been near me, they might have be subjected to hearing rather a few swearwords coming out of my mouth as my head was telling me that I f***ing hated running, I hated the sun, I hated the heat, I hated the flies….and so on. I felt like I was running through a scene from something like “Little House on the Prairie” as I could see no evidence of civilisation……just an endless winding dirt road through hot sunny grassland under a hot clear blue sky, only broken up by the odd cattle grid to negotiate. The guys were meeting me more often than we’d originally thought (due to the heat and sun) but it still felt like ages between the times when I saw them. One of the race medics drove past me and commented that I must have had about half a kilo of flies hitching a lift on my hat, and I replied that the other half kilo seemed to be between my glasses and my eyes as they were everywhere and were not even slightly concerned by me flapping and swatting at them!
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| Crew swopover time :-) |
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| A long hot lonely road |
The two of them got me through what seemed like a very long section of dusty gravel roads, cattle grids, climbs and descents and endless plains (well, I guess there’s a reason they call that region the “High Plains”), but at least it meant that I had passed the 100K point and then the halfway mark. Soon after that I also passed Amy and moved into the lead in the “ladies’ race”. It felt as if her crew had been timing the gap between us as when she was ahead of me, they would wait for me to come into sight before driving off to catch her up, and when I was ahead of her they would drive up to where I was before waiting for her. Maybe I imagined it, but it didn’t bother me, as I just wanted to get to the finish myself and knew that whatever anyone else did was up to them, be they ahead or behind me…..you can only run your own race!
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| Passing Amy |
It was actually lovely to run as evening descended as the temperature cooled and the sun sank lower and lower in the sky. I was starting to wonder how far I’d get before needing to put on my high-viz top and head torch……as initially I thought that I was just about at Dalgety, but the road was misleading as although I thought I was on the run down towards the hall (and pub!!!) I still had another hill to climb first. Michael and Geordie drove past just before dark to see where I was…..they must have recognised my running style as my head was hidden from view as I tried to wrestle myself into a warmer top and high viz vest without having to stop running.
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| Running off into the sunset |
As you enter Dalgety there are signposts pointing both right and left, both indicating a road to Jindabyne. I was so glad to be turning left as this was the shorter route, but this was mitigated via the fact it meant I had to ascend the Beloka Range of hills. That was still a long way away and so I put it out of my mind and thankfully ran into Dalgety Hall. I was the first person to enter after dark and so my head torch surprised the crews sitting there, and me being female also caught them by surprise, as when I asked where the toilets were, I was directed to the men’s. Having found the ladies, it was hard to make myself stand up again after sitting down, but the reward for doing so was that I got to wash my face in the sinks there. Unfortunately there were no G&Ts to be had (ha….false promises!!) and I was still too hot to want the pumpkin soup on offer (I usually love pumpkin soup), but the crusty bread and proper butter was like manna from heaven and so Geordie stocked up on several more rolls and butter to take on the road for me.
It seemed very dark when we left Dalgety but the temperature was much more pleasant. Geordie kept feeding me the crusty rolls as we pooled along the road which was very much appreciated. We had been gradually climbing (with some undulations) since Dalgety. But then Michael had the job of coming up the Bloke Range with me. We kept thinking that we’d started the steep climb, only to run downhill for another short stretch before the road kicked up again. Once we started the actual 5K “climb”, we certainly knew about it as the average elevation rise was 6.4% to a high point of 1171m. Support cars were not allowed to stop on this climb either, but I wasn’t entirely sure as to why, as the road was tarred and much wider then Big Jack and there was even a parking bay partway up!
We had another funny incident further along the road towards Jindabyne as I was relying on my crew to tell me about any junctions coming up. Geordie was back with me on the road and as he is not known for his navigation skills, he asked the car to stay near us at junctions rather than just motor ahead to Jindabyne. They informed us from the car that we had a roundabout coming up at which we must turn right into Jindy, but then suddenly Jono (who was driving Amy’s support camper van) pulled up alongside us and told us that we should go straight on across the roundabout. We thought he was playing with us, jokingly sending me the wrong way so that Amy could move back into the lead, but when I did try turning right at said roundabout, it turned out that Jono had been right as the right turn took me down a private road into an accommodation complex (and the right turn was at a T-junction 500m behind the roundabout)!!
I had thought that when the guys said I just had to turn right to run down into Jindabyne, that I was almost there….but no, there was more than 5K to go to reach the built-up area, and it started with yet another uphill stretch. There was nowhere to run except in the road but luckily it was well after midnight and so there was no traffic……I would say that there were no cars on the roads at all, but unfortunately the one that we did see, didn’t like us much, and decided to speed up and head straight towards us (despite our head torches and reflective high viz clothing) meaning that we had to jump off the road and into the long grass to avoid being mown down!!! Nice……but it certainly woke me up!
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| My crew enjoying the night! |
Surprisingly, for a run where you have to provide your own vehicle support, the route into Jindabyne was one that the car could not follow me on. It was described as a 1km run along a bike path beside the lake, which sounded pleasant enough….but as it turned out, it was several kms of undulating bike path complete with turns and speed bumps, which weren’t that easy to see by the light of a little head torch (bought the week beforehand from ALDI!). Even more bizarre was the fact that the bike path ended in the middle of a caravan park with no obvious marking or signposts so I had to wind my way round caravans in the dark trying to work out how to get back to the main road to meet my crew at the next mandatory check-in point.
I had hoped to be leaving Jindabyne just before dawn as I was told that it was a magical scene to see the sun rising over the lake as you looked back on the road behind you, but unfortunately (!) as was way ahead of this schedule as I passed through and on down to the Thredbo River at about 1:30am. It was a long slog up from the river into the National Park, and I swear that if I closed my eyes, I could fall asleep whilst still walking, but Julian now took his turn walking and running with me, so there was new chat to keep me awake. I was quite cold at this point in time, so had put a down jacket on and was wearing a beanie and gloves…..not usual Australian running attire I know, but at least the cold meant I kept moving…..and it was rather encouraging to still overtake the odd person along the way.
As I had gone through Jindabyne a lot earlier than planned, Jenna was still sleeping so we thought it kinder to let her get more rest and so the 3 guys swopped in and out of the car depending on when they wanted some fresh air and exercise, and when they were bored of my whinging and wanted some rest (so much rest that I actually had to knock on the car window and wake them up at one point!). Running through dawn gave me a lift, as did ticking off the various ski resorts as I progressed up the valley, starting with the wonderfully names “Smiggins Holes”.
Jenna drove by and stopped to see me into Perisher which was another mandatory check-in point for the race. I would say that passing through Perisher is rather a non-event out of ski season, as everything is closed and boarded up…..and the only living beings seemed to be my crew standing by the car. What made it stand out in my memory was that we finally had phone signal and so Geordie got a group call from the Trotter girls who were on their Saturday morning run. It was lovely to hear them all and draw support from them, as I’d felt that I was rather “over” running by then. I was having such a good chat to them that Geordie had to actually get me off the phone and make me continue on my way.
From there is was just under 10K up to Charlotte’s Pass and the guys were really good about keeping me moving on up the road, as when we hit steeper sections and I slowed to a walk, we’d set mini targets of a landmark where I would stop and walk, and anther one of where I’d start running again. The guys had told me that I was well under course record time, but that as the weather had been closing in, they’d heard talk of the course being shortened to the “inclement weather” version, which means that we would have been stopped at Charlotte’s Pass (at about 1800m and 222K into the “run”). As much as I wanted to be at the finish, I really didn’t want the course to be shortened as that would mean that I had no chance of setting a record.
It was getting colder and windier all the time, but although I had tights and capris with me, I did not want to change out of my shorts, as I knew that if I sat down and took my shoes off to change, then I would be very unlikely to get up again, and certainly not put my shoes on again! Instead I “rugged up” my top half with a jacket, buff and gloves and the car went ahead to get our “mandatory summit kit” checked by the race crew at Charlotte’s Pass. Luckily for me, you were allowed to have as many of your crew as wanted to come with you on the final 18K, and they were allowed to carry my mandatory kit as well as theirs. I thought that there would be a medical check before I started this final push, but after a brief hello etc, I was waved onto the trail.
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| Slogging up Kosci |
The trail is initially suitable for mountain bikes as it undulated along the hillside and so I was able to keep running, and my crew had to chase me down. As we then descended to cross the Snowy River we cheered on the leading man and his team coming back up from it towards the finish (the last 18K was an out and back section). After that it was a much steeper climb up towards the “summit ridge”……when I say ridge, it’s not exactly what Europeans would call a ridge, but it was steep enough for my tired legs to be glad of a walk rather than a run. Charlotte’s Pass to the summit and back is a popular day walk and so there were markers for me to count off every km, and we passed several other people out enjoying the bracing air (wearing rather more clothes than my little shorts!!). The second man was pushing hard as he and his team descended but I didn’t think he had any chance of making up the gap to the leader (and, in fact, his time from Perisher to the Finish was only 7 seconds quicker than mine despite the speed of his descent).
The path seemed to wind round and round (but always into a strong headwind) and never actually get to the summit, but we finally made it….and my crew asked some other tourists if they would mind waiting for their photo opportunities whilst they took a picture of me by the Strelecki Monument at 2228m elevation (they then sent it to race HQ as a check-in time). I decided that there was no way I would be doing much running in that final 9k back to Charlotte’s Pass as the ground was rather rough, I was so tired that I felt like I could hardly pick my feet up, and my eyes were playing up due to the wind, the cold, tiredness and the length of time I’d had my lenses in, that I was finding it quite hard to see clearly.
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| The Strelecki Monument |
I surprised myself by being able to run more of the descent than I’d thought I could, albeit at a snail’s pace, but by the time I got back to the mountain bike path, I was so cold that I told Geordie and Julian that I needed to run properly to warm up (Michael had gone ahead to warn Jenna of our imminent arrival and take a finisher’s photo for me). In the end I put rather a lot of distance into them over the last couple of kms that I had time to finish, chat to a few people, find the toilets and still get back to see them across the line (supporting them as they’d supported me!).
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| The Finish!! |
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| Showing how underdressed I was compared |
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| to everyone else at Charlotte's Pass!!! |
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| With my crew the morning after by Lake Jindy |
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| The alumni of C2K 2020 |
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