DNF at TNF 100

Saturday May 14, 2011 (The North Face 100k Race)
I often encourage people to write about their races as we can also learn something from the experience, regardless of the outcome. And as the title suggests for me The North Face 100k race, held in the Blue  Mountains on Saturday May 14th, 2011 was not the result I imagined, although rereading the post before the race, perhaps I should have expected it. I guess no one really sets out to race thinking they would not finish. So what happened?

Hammer and I arrived at registration in Leura about 6.30pm on Friday.  Registration was a bit crowded and lots of nervous energy as people lined up to get their number, then lined up again to get the gear checked, then lined up again to get the race T-shirt.  All done we headed out and I saw the Kinesio taping stand – they were offering to tape up any runner with a niggling injury or area of concern. Beauty I thought, just what I needed. A bandaid for my dodgy hamstring. So off I went and few minutes later had the physio working her fingers along the hamstring group and then applying the tape over the glutes, down the two sides of the hamstring to just near the outside of the knee. It felt great so I was set. Back to the house we were sharing with 3 others running tomorrow, we had a lovely dinner and lots of excitement building over the coming day.

Woke at 4.30 race day after a great night sleep, got dressed and breakfast of small bowl of brown rice followed by coffee and I was ready to go. Temperature was 2 degrees when we arrived at Fairmont at 5.30am for the morning race briefing.  The welcome to country ceremony was very moving with the sound of the didgeridoo echoing in the hall. I tried to capture that sound in my imagination so I could replay it in my mind as I headed down the beautiful river valleys later in the day. For the first time in my life, I think I began to understand the link between the haunting sound of that instrument and the beauty of the vast open spaces we were about to enter.

That over we were ushered out to the start line. I lined up at the back of wave 2 with a few people I had been training with over the past few months and before too long we were off. Glorious rays of the sun just breaking over the tops of the tree tops reflecting the lovely colour of  autumn  leaves.

No time to linger but time to run. As on other distance runs I knew it would take me at least 10 ks to settle into a rhythm so I just focused on staying relaxed and chatting to the people around me.  We soon left the streets of Leura and headed down the first section of single track before emerging onto the streets again. It was on the second stretch of road less than 5ks into the race, running on a slight downhill that I noticed my left knee was feeling painful. There was strange tension pulling on the knee from the back and it hurt to put weight on it. It felt like it could not support my bodyweight. So what did I do, I took Voltaren and waited for it to get better. Knowing that the Voltaren for emergencies only I was not happy with the fact that the emergency had arisen so early. I rationalised that I had run a 10k road run the previous Wednesday and while the knee was a little bit niggly on the downhills this was whole new sensation. Suddenly it dawned on me – the Kinesio tape. Uhh…ah.. – this could be the cause and if only I could whip this off then all would be well. Running through the bush with my hand down my pants trying to scrape the tape off my glutes, down the hammy to just below the knee, was not a good look. I did not care, if this was the cause then surely it can be easily fixed. And after removing the tape it felt better for a little while. However by the time we reached the slippery stairs of the Leura Cascades the pain on the descents was worse with jarring pain each time I stepped on my left leg.  I kept waiving through runners behind me not wanting to hold anybody up and pretty soon it was a steady procession of runners moving past me. Funny how the pain in the right achilles which a few weeks ago I thought may be a problem, receded into the recesses of the brain which as overwhelmed with a new problem.  So I took a Panadol and kept moving on. It was not too long after that that I realised that this was not going to go away, I was having trouble on the downhill rock scramble, stuff I have done many times before with relative ease – it was just not me. So slowly accepting that my race was over 15ks in I burst into tears and continued to cry all the way to CP 1 at Narrowneck, where I pulled out.  Hammer came and picked me up as well as two others who pulled out here: an Irish guy from Melbourne and a runner from Canberra. Disappointed about my first ever DNF, confused about what actually went wrong and puffy from crying I went back to the house, had a shower and tried to salvage something from the day. We drove out to CP 3 at Megalong Rd and for a few hours cheered on the runners that were coming through then drove to the finish and waited for the lead runners to come in.  I got to see the Catalan sensation Killian Jornet win the race in 9hrs 19min looking very much like the pro runner that he is. 

By this time my legs were frozen from standing around, we went back inside the Fairmont Resort, who generously turned their hotel over to the race, and sat in the bar had a wine and enjoyed the beautiful colours of the setting sun over the trees surrounding golf course – thinking of all the runners heading out towards Jamison Valley and the long night they still have ahead of them.

So while my first goal was not achieved - I did not finish - we did make the  start of the SMH Half Marathon the next day where Hammer ran a blistering 97 minutes – a time he has not run for well over 10 years. So very happy that he is running so well and for me it is time to head back to the doctor to try and figure out what happened.  And in a later post maybe a few words on what I learnt from the experience.