XTerra Hunua 2021

25th July 2021

Race Day

Our RunLikeCrazy team numbers were healthy today, with pretty much everyone participating, including the Barker family and the Duffs.

The trails were damp after previous rain, but the morning started out fine.

I drove me, Brett, Will, Nev and Michal out to the event. 7:00am pickup from Ascot was about right.

A total of 1040 competitors ran today!

Racing

I had run a reasonably hard 8km the previous day, so I wasn't expecting too much from myself. And so it turned out.

We started out on the Super Long (with Barnaby doing the Mid Course as his comeback run). As expected, Michal zoomed out quickly, with Me, Will and Neville trying to keep up.

The first 10km is mostly nice single track, with a stream crossing to get our feet wet.

Very nice running. I slowly dropped back from the other 3, feeling a bit lacking in energy.

After 11km, we hit the huge climb up ARA Drive. I resorted to power walking pretty early, although Michal ran the entire climb!

By the time we entered the dreaded Pukapuka track, I had lost sight of the others, which was just fine by me :)

Pukapuka was its normal rooty, knotty, muddy, hilly self. Great running!

After moving along pretty well for half of Pukapuka, I started getting cramp in my right calf. No good reason for this... I swigged some CrampFix as needed to keep it in abeyance and it didn't slow me down too much. I got overtaken by Gary, and he and I then traded positions multiple times until we got out to the long downhill gravel road. With about 2km to go, my cramp disappeared and I got a burst of energy and ran fast and hard to defeat Gary by a minute or so.

Meanwhile, Will and Nev had battled it out (as normal), with Will finally catching Nev and outsprinting him to the finish. Michal had crushed it and ended up 3rd? in the super competitive 40+ field! Brett had run the XC Champs on Saturday and was brave to back it up with a very solid 2nd place in 60+!