Let’s cut straight to the punchline shall we because I know what you’re thinking, “this guy always carries on a bit and what else could possibly go wrong at one of his races?” and this, this could go wrong.

You can either come along for the ride or skip a(fat)head to find out what happened, that’s up to you.

Either way, here goes…

About a month ago I registered for a 10km race, 100kms from home and in usual Sputnik style, I somehow find myself headed to the start line of an 8km and 20km run on consecutive days 500km from home. Runner’s know how it goes. Meh, it happens. Don’t ask me how exactly, but ioMerino are sponsoring The Wonderland Run and there was a free ticket and… nek minnit.

(OK, it may also have something to do with the fact I see the 8km race has an awesome pink medal and, well, here we are.)

I drive over to Halls Gap on Thursday so I can have a bit of explore time on Friday before helping out on the ioMerino stand late Friday afternoon when bib pick up starts. It’s a sensible plan so of course I fuck it up by deciding I could probably squeeze in a meeting in Melbourne if I time it just right, so end up driving three hours to Melbourne first thing Friday morning in the fog and rain, having my meeting, (where I mostly just take stupid selfies including one with an actual replica of the Sputnik Satellite and hell yeah), then driving another three hours to arrive back like clockwork for the 4:30 expo/bib pick up kick off and honestly, that going smoothly was probably the last time anything else went well for the weekend.

Bib pick up goes beautifully, I smash a bowl of pasta with the big boss of io, then settle in for the night knowing the 8km race on Saturday doesn’t start til 2pm. Which leaves me just enough time to still get up early, go look for birds, work on the io stand again for a few hours, then race.

Saturday morning I sneak in a bit of birding and even though I don’t get any great pics, spot some Gang Gang Cockatoos and I’m pretty bloody stoked about that. I take some pictures of a waterfall which is also nice enough, but probably has less water than when I accidentally left the Puratap on for a few hours and flooded my entire house back in January. I then stalk a crimson rosella for about an hour trying to get a decent shot not knowing that when I get back to town there’ll be plenty of them just hanging out, having lattes at the local cafe…

And although my embarrassing camo is mildly successful at fooling the birds, it’s apparently no good at pulling the merino wool over a leech’s eyes and I manage to end up with one between my fingers and how the fuck did that even get there? Leeches are such assholes and I was lucky I managed to flick him off although who knew you could bleed so much from between your fingers? Eek. I make it back to town and spend the next hour trying not to vomit in my mouth or bleed over the clothes on the io stand or on any customers. And the rest of the weekend wondering if there’s one down my pants every time I imagine I can feel something where it shouldn’t be.

I see a lovely couple, (of people, not leeches), I know and make a big deal about how she’d won an entry to the 8km race courtesy of ioMerino and when her partner looks at me confused and everyone else looks at me like I just killed the queen, I realise it was supposed to be a surprise and fucked that up big time, didn’t I? She’d managed to keep it a secret all week, and right before surprising him on the start line, good old big mouth strikes again. In my defence, the winners were announced on the fucking internet so it’s not like it was a state secret… sigh. Sorry again guys.

Basically their reaction when I ruined the surprise.

For most of the morning instead of doing anything resembling actual work I just chat to customers about running including to one lady who has done the 20km before and when I make the mistake of asking what it was like she says she cried the first time she did it. When I ask if she’s serious she clarifies it was more like “sobbing” and holy. fucking. shit.

Usually I’d be thinking 2.5hours for a 20km trail race but I knew this one pulled some serious elevation early so I figure it might be more like 3hrs and now I’m wondering if I should take a fucking head torch. And some tissues to sob into.

But meh, the 20km isn’t til Sunday morning so I bugger around a bit more pretending to be useful, then go and get changed and line up for the 8km mostly flat run. Pro tip: Always be suspicious when they put the word ‘flat’ in those little inverted commas.

My plan is to take it real easy and save my energy for the bigger race the next day but instead I decide to go hell for leather and that I’ll worry about the next day, the next day.

Everything’s going pretty smoothly til about the 5km mark when we hear something that can only be described as the giant, extended crack and smash of a massive tree falling right behind us, because it was a massive tree falling right behind us, and I have the presence of mind to yell “TIMBER!” just like in the movies. Not gonna lie, it’s a moment. And I laugh thinking that just when I think I’ll have nothing to write about, this happens. *shrugs* I then spend the next 3kms wondering if anyone got squished and if you yell ‘timber’ because it’s called timber, or it’s called ‘timber’ because that’s what you yell. (For what it’s worth, I looked this up on the Forestry Forum where someone else asked this exact same question and one of the answers was “It’s a lot more effective than yelling ‘Fish!” and, well, fair enough.)

For those who are wondering, if a tree falls in the forest and there’s a bunch of trail runners there to hear it, it makes some serious fucking noise. Which reminds me of that joke “if a man speaks in the forest and there’s no woman there to hear him, is he still wrong?” but that joke should probably be changed to “is he still a mansplainer?” now because, no reason, will not be explaining that one.

Now, you may be surprised to hear that other than that, it all goes pretty smoothly. I do a decent time. Finish. And, ah, why the fuck is my bottom lip tingling? Then my top lip? Then my whole mouth and it feels like I’ve just been to the dentist which is weird cause it’s more like 3pm although that’s 2:30pm local time in SA which we all know is dentist time. Please don’t make me explain it. OK. Sure. 2:30… tooth hurty. There, I said it.

But fuck, I literally can’t feel my face.

Very quickly my whole face has gone AWOL and although I’m pretty sure I’m fine, I see some people I know who tell me my face is melting and are worried I might be having a stroke so it’s off to the medi tent we go. By this stage I’m feeling very fucking average and after checking me out, the doctor type person tells me to get the fuck out and that I’m fine and lady, I promise you, I’m not great looking at the best of times, but my face does not usually look like a dropped pie!

(EDIT: The doctor type person did not really tell me to get the fuck out. I assumed people would know this was a joke, but for those of you who may have been wondering if a medical professional said that, no they did not. After performing what they have since described as a “comprehensive neurological examination” they did tell me I was fine. Which is probably the first time ever no one has had an issue with how my brain works. They were, of course, very professional and caring and lovely. Hope this clears this up.)

I decide it’s nothing a handful of antihistamines and a pizza can’t fix, and without any clue what it was I was allergic to because up to that point, I haven’t been allergic to anything, I call it night doing my best Steven Segal impersonation. One decent race. One puffed up face. And on we go.

A few people have since suggested I might be allergic to running, and it’s a reasonable call. I’m just grateful I’m not allergic to writing too many words because I would be well and truly dead by now.

The next morning is the 20km and my face looks less like the Michelin Man and it’s race time. I know the first half of the race is going to have lots of upness but fuck. my. brown. dog. This is just stupid. Up up and away we go and can. not. breathe.

I thought I’d seeded myself sensibly in the third wave but about half way up when pretty much every single person has passed me I decide I may have been one of those fuckheads who uses a unique combo of optimism and stupidity to get in everyone’s fucking way.

There’s a lady next to me who is clearly having about as much fun as I am and she looks at me and says “mother fucker” and lady, spot on. This ascent is exactly that. I say to her “I think I may have gotten it wrong starting in the third wave” and she replies “I may have gotten it wrong starting at all” and yes to that also. I like this lady. A lot.

Skipping forward for a second, it’s after the race that another friend of mine who shall remain nameless but it was Brett from Adelaide Trail Runners, says to me “I was going to text you after the race” and when I ask why, he says it was because there was a really narrow section that he only just fit through and he was wondering if I may have been wedged in there and mate, I would be angry and hurt if it wasn’t also 100% accurate.

Forget the fat shaming tree in Mt Gambier and the fat shaming gate at Melrose, I literally get wedged in this passageway and when I turn side-on to do a bit of a shimmy, between my pack and my gut, it does not help. At all. I start to think about James Franco in that movie 127 hours but I don’t have a pocket knife or a liposuction machine and I’m gonna feel real bad if everyone behind me DNFs because they can’t get past me blocking this crevice.

Thankfully I manage to scrape my way through there and look, I’m gonna blame it on still being puffed up from that allergic reaction and also from being a bit of a fatty and holy shit, surely I wasn’t the only person that had issues there? Definitely taking some lube next time.

When we finally get to the pinnacle it’s time for some pics including the worst selfie of all time which I’m going to blame on my squinty pig eyes, then it’s time to slip on some rocks and split my fucking hand open. I’m pretty sure it’s not too bad so I just get back up and keep running and all I can hear behind me is people saying “oh, there’s lot of blood on the trail hopefully everyone’s alright” and at this stage I’m so fucked from the uphill that bleeding to death is the least of my worries.

I track the elevation on my GPS and when we finally get to the peak I’m like thank fuck, finally I can run some down except I can’t because it’s so fucking steep and slippery and rocky and fuck this shit. When you can’t run the up OR the down, it really doesn’t leave much.

Finally the gradient levels out to just shy of vertical and I can run a bit, smashing my quads but also actually catching a few people. Admittedly some of them were people who had stopped to help an injured runner, and look, me stopping to gawk isn’t going to add anything so I just shoot on past and see ya suckers! (Except not really because stopping for injured runners is absolutely what you should do but considering a) there were already more than enough people stopped, b) I have zero fucking medical expertise to contribute. c) there’s no way I’m carrying anyone down that hill and d) I’m pretty fucking over this race, there’s really no point me stopping to say something ingenious like “are you ok?” when clearly she’s not and I can’t do anything about it.

From there it’s a relatively civilised trundle to the finish line, past the final aid station that is stocked with donuts and you know I’m doing it tough when I don’t even have one, or five, and that finish line cannot come soon enough.

I head into the medi tent and see my friends from the day before and at first they’re super alarmed with what’s going on with my hand before they realise I’m wearing black nail polish and it’s only a small cut and they put a bandaid on and tell me the get the fuck out. Again. Which I do. Again. So I order a pizza. Again. And fuck knows how people did the longer courses and I won’t be doing this race ever. Again.

(EDIT: The doctor type person did not really tell me to get the fuck out this time either. I assumed people would know this was a joke as well, but for those of you who may have been wondering if a medical professional said that, no they did not. After putting a bandaid on my finger, they did tell me I was fine. They were, of course, very professional and caring and lovely. Hope this clears this up.)

 

UPDATE: Was going to include some official race pics from Supersport Images but actually, navigating their website to find, and buy, my pics is actually harder than running that fucking race and they can eat a big bag of dicks.

(EDIT: Before the photo people also contact me to complain, I don’t really expect them to eat a big bag of dicks. Their photos are great. I am just incapable of navigating their website. But it’s me, not them. I’m sure their website and their service is top notch. Hope this clears this up.)

Fuck me, I’ve been writing these things for years in SA and not one complaint ever. Go and do one race in Victoria and the shit hits the fan. EDIT: No actual shit hit any actual fan. No appliances at all. Fuck.

 

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