Sydney Trailwalker 2003 - Report from Winning Team
Report by Trevor JacobsTeam 5 : Powered by Lansa - finished 1st in 12hrs 58mins
1. Jonathan Worswick
2. Nigel Aylott
3. Adrian Sheppard
4. Trevor Jacobs
Dear readers
This records one of my most rewarding wins in a team event. Seeing as I had no intention of doing it right up to close beforehand, the facts of the situation are quite extraordinary, so I'll briefly describe them in dot point:
1. A Sydney Striders team asked me to join them a month or two beforehand, but I declined that opportunity as I had agreed to partner David Baldwin in a 24 hour Rogaine at about the same time as the Trailwalker.
2. About 7 days before the newly timed Trailwalker (postponed due to flooding) I received a telephone call from Jonathon Worswick who asked me to join his team as Tim Sloane from Tasy couldn't do it any more. I was on leave, and took about 4 days to commit fully to doing it. After contemplating it all for that time I realised that it represented an opportunity too good to miss, as I might never do an event like this again and it would be great to try and keep up with Jonathon and Nigel Aylott and Andy Kromar. The aim of our team was to give the Ghurkhas times a run for their money, and to at least be competitive with them even though they weren't actually there for this race (they went to the Melbourne Trailwalker a bit earlier instead after the postponement from the Sydney floods).
3. One day before the event I get an email from Adrian asked me to ring him. I did so and soon learned that Nigel had been twisting his arm to take Andy's place as he couldn't come any more due to good snow falls at Falls Creek resulting in him having work duties to fulfil. Also, Nigel had completed a hugely gruelling adventure event the week end before the trailwalker, so he was backing up and we all thought it would be interesting to see how that went - he seemed totally unperturbed by the prospect.
4. After persistent pestering and deal making with transport and gear arrangements we managed to get Ads on the team - which was great as we were once again all set and I was extra happy to be running with Ads, my other rogaining partner. We made a bit of a pact to not kill ourselves during the event and to support each other if either of us was suffering up the back should we fall into a hole, as we both were a bit worried about our lack of preparation (especially Ads as he only had one day's notice!).
5. We depart Canberra 6pm Thursday night and bunk up at Jono's place 10.30pm. After a good brecky Friday morning, Kate (Jono's partner and fantastic team support person for the event) drove us all to the start in their little 4WD. We got through all the preliminaries ok, although it is amazing how quickly that time goes making it easy to forget something if you are not careful - nonetheless we started the event all intact.
6. Straight away I get boxed in and fall 100m behind the other 3, and it takes half of the first hill to rejoin them - they were looking back wondering what the hell I'd been up to!
7. So we start this epic adventure full of hope and a few fears I must admit, at least for me as this was my first trailwalker, whereas the others had done them before. I don't recall much of the first two legs, apart from thinking how warm it was and thought about the need to drink a lot. We also had two team ahead of us for a while, and noted that the time to CP1 was about 6 mins off the record. So we surged a bit to hit the front for little while - until we took a wrong turn (we were talking too much I suspect) down a street. Team Makani called out to us, which was very good of them, and for a long while thereafter we trailed behind them.
8. We dropped a few minutes behind Makani at times, especially at CP's as they were extremely slick there, whereas we were taking much more time to refill bottles and eat etc. We accidentally found ourselves back in front of them at CP3 as a result of them taking a wrong turn somewhere - we didn't even notice apart from hearing some voices behind us a few times, and we thought that another team was moving up onto us from behind, to later realise it must have been team Makani.
9. CP 3 to 4 was a great leg for us, our time ended up 6 mins under the old record. After that Ads was starting to get concerned about not drinking enough in the earlier legs, and was getting a few signs of cramping etc. So we eased back a bit and decided to have a couple of decent breaks to make sure that we all recovered well and got well hydrated for the rest of the journey. We were very sensible here for a while, which was amazing really!, and decided to walk up most of the steeper pinches. We had a long break at CP6 (10 mins) taking on board wonderful soup and sandwiches and all sorts of yummy stuff. I personally was very grateful for the longer breaks and the walked bits as I was certainly on the limit of my abilities for a long while and this gave me a good breather, getting me through to the end without dropping too much.
10. The leg from CP 6 to 7 was truly amazing. The full moon caused a mammoth tide and the trail along the water's edge frequently disappeared deep underwater. For a while we skirted around it but then gave and just ploughed through it, getting our bot bots wet. Also, Jono and Nigel had given Ads and I heaps of curry for running in racing flats in an event like this, and raved on about us crazy ACT runners, so at CP 7 I took the opportunity to change out of my wet shoes and socks and put on new dry ones. The feeling for me was truly magic - the extra padding in the thicker training shoes felt marvellous and the dry socks were too.
11. Between CP 7 and 8 Jono warned us about the massive barbed wire fence - when we got there it looked truly horrendous, and I immediately hooked my toe on a rock and launched towards it, but luckily did not connect with it. Jono mumbled something about sod's law, and I was feeling so tired by this stage I just agreed to myself and decided to concentrate on avoiding it a bit harder. We were also trying to do our sums to see if we could break 13 hours. Ads was the misbeliever with that notion and the rest of us gave him heaps for that, even though we probably didn't really care all that much if we were a bit over at the end - but then again, a 12 number looks a whole lot better than 13!! So we were all quietly spurred along I'm sure.
12. The last leg flew by, as the terrain was so much easier to run on. Maybe we could get there in under 13?? It started to look quite possible. Jono was almost having kittens at the thought, and was practically running up and back on the spot urging us along (he obviously had far too much energy left). We followed the course markings off course on the headland opposite the two Sydney Harbour heads as some bushwalkers had obviously been up to tricks. We estimated we'd lost about 6 mins which once again put 13 hrs in jeopardy. Ads started up again about not making it, so we again canned his disbelieving attitude and put our backs into 100%.
13. We flew over the last bit and it seemed like a flat out sprint down the last hill, over the steps and across the grass to that beautiful finish line!! WE did it!! I took me a while to get my breath back, whilst Nigel and Jono looked like they'd just had a picnic in the park. Ads got cold straight away and went and got dressed up, whereas I felt too hot for quite a while, but then cooled off suddenly and did likewise.
14. The food and drinks and conversations at the finish area were fantastic, as was the official presentation.... We soaked it all up. We learned that we were the first aussie team to win a Trailwalker, so that felt just great. We waited a while for the next team, but took off before they showed up as we weren't sure when they'd arrive at the finish and also Ads and I had agreed to drive straight back to Canberra afterwards as we had things to do on the weekend.
15. We got back in ACT about 3am and hit the sack totally contented with a great day's work. For me it was a truly truly magnificent event and an unbelievable outcome for a team hotch potched together on short notice - were feel so lucky and privileged. I now have a great appreciation of all the excellent trails in amongst the various urban parts of Sydney - I had no idea that they were so good.
It'd be great to do it again with the Ghurkhas there to see how we shape up against them. If we were somewhere close to them at the end then that be good enough I reckon as they are awesome runners.
