The Great Ocean Walk

I had always heard overwhelmingly positive reviews about the Great Ocean Walk 100km event, and was determined to be a part of it in 2014. After the night of my 30th birthday, I had an alarm set for quarter to six to get up and register as soon as entries opened - it had sold out every year, some times within days and I wasn't leaving it to chance that I would miss it this year. I managed to get in and accepted that day and was set to target that as my "A race" for the year. That was, until the miler came up. After the miler I had achieved what I wanted for a while, and was more than happy to just run for the enjoyment of it and not push any new limits. SCTR night runs were a brilliant social catch up, many members were also jumping on on other ad-hoc runs I was doing and having an enthusiastic and determined runner to coach was very inspiring. I drifted, albeit quite happily, through August and September with some decent long runs, but not a great deal of training for GOW. I was quite casual in my lead up to the event as it was "another 100" - I should have realised this was quite familiar...

I was lucky enough to car pool to accommodation in Apollo Bay the night before with my Anglesea running buddy, Chris and got a nice meal at rego, all checked off and a reasonable night's sleep. The morning came around and everything was looking pretty good. A nice start onto easy urban trail for the first few kms, then hitting up some beaches and then the real heart of the trail. It was a beautiful place to run in and I thoroughly enjoyed the views of the amazing coastline. I was lucky enough to run with Lucy Bartholomew for a bit again as she was running this one pretty easy. I smashed out the downhills and eventually pulled ahead, not competing but just enjoying smashing downhills way too much. My head was definitely in the right space as I was just out to enjoy the run and experience of running with other like minded people, but I think I was enjoying it a little too much.

I made it through to the end of Johanna beach feeling okay, but starting to get pretty warm and really feeling the effect on my legs from all those downhills I'd been a little too enthusiastic on. I was still in good spirits, but unfortunately that didn't last too long. After the highlights of the early parts of the course I was starting to struggle to keep moving and see the rest. All I wanted was to see what it was like and in my mind, I already had. Four big issues were coming together to derail my run: lack of sleep, failure to cut out caffeine, no desire to finish and insufficient training. Any one or two of those would have been reasonably manageable, but when all you want is a coffee and your staggering after each hill climb in the heat, you have no clear reason in your head why the run is still important and your body isn't handling the demands of the course, you start to hit a wall.

That wall was nothing like I had expected. I had been targeting bigger and bigger events to see what it was like when my body wanted to give out and to know whether I could beat it by throwing every ounce of determination at it. This was different. This was me losing sight of what I wanted and letting everything haunt me because I could see no reason in finishing. I literally lay down to rest 3 or 4 times before finally staggering in to the 80km aid station. I was done. I felt I had no energy left to continue and could see no reason to do it. The first half of the course was quite reasonable with longer climbs and descents but not too steep. After Johanna beach it was a series of rough short and steep climbs and descents, constantly taunting you. I remember thinking so many times "why the hell did I need to climb that if it's just descending immediately" and on it went, again and again. The support at the aid station was brilliant. They would not let me quit and despite remaining there for half an hour, after a coffee, some soft drink and refilling one of my bottles with cola, they sent me out of there to finish what I'd started. Less than a kilometre along I found fellow SCTR, Siqi, looking just like I felt. At that moment I'd found exactly what I needed to finish the race. We were going to finish it together if it killed us.

I made a pact with Siqi that we were going to run to the 12km mark and then stop and drink that flat cola with all the awesome caffeine it had to offer. No thinking about the 20km left, it was just 12km till our stop, with a nice little checkpoint 8km along. With small achievable goals set ahead of us we trudged along and eventually did make that 12km point and had that cola and it was incredible. Generic, flat, warm cola. There wasn't anywhere to really sit there, so we just sat on the side of the road and enjoyed it. Feeling finally within reach of our goal, we stood up and made our way along the final trails to the finish at the twelve apostles. I had just wanted to the make that point in the daylight so I could have seen them and we were within reach of that goal. Despite Siqi having a nasty spill, he got up, kept moving and we finished it together in 13 hours and 32 minutes, 3 full hours longer than my Surf Coast Century time, but having learned so much to take away with me. The post race atmosphere was incredible back at the hostel, with many competitors, including the elites, sitting around chatting. This continued as we all had breakfast together before the race presentations the next morning and was a real highlight of the event.

Reading all of this you might think it's quite a hellish event and only for extreme competitors, but I would say this certainly isn't true. It's a tough course, but I made a lot of mistakes that I paid for. This is the advice I would give to entrants: the first half is easier, save yourself for the second half; don't underestimate the impact the heat will have on your day and train in the heat if possible; get plenty of sleep in the week leading up and quit caffeine - you can't afford to be falling asleep on your feet; use caffeine to pick you up when you are flat, it really is a wonder drug for trail runners; and finally, have a compelling reason why the run is important. For me the run became important when I realised that despite it being my run, it could mean a lot to other people as well and if I am to enter a race, who does it help to if I fail? At the very least seeing me DNF might put them off entering.

Now I have no delusions of grandeur or self-importance, but we are all part of a community and I believe that finishing that run was in some way a small part of my contribution to that community. I know that reading about others that have completed runs, particularly in tough situations, has inspired me and some times people need that as the kick to set their own ambitious goals so that made it worth trying. And to have some company for that final 20km and finish it together turned the whole race around and gave it a very special way to finish. I highly recommend the event to anyone considering entering, but respect the event, pace yourself and be prepared. These may all sound obvious but it is so easy to miss some of that without really thinking about what you'll need to finish the event. Above all, find what you need to finish the event and keep it with you until the end - no matter what the race, you're definitely going to need it.

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