We did it!

After having to run in the 50km event in the 2004 trailblazer challenge, I set my sights on the 100km event for 2005. When Phil Laing asked if I'd like to join the Power of Four team for this year's event, I knew I'd be in with a chance of meeting my three goals for the event: finishing the 100km as a complete team, winning the event, and finishing the event in a good time. Well the event is over and we have fulfilled at least two of the goals.

Despite a couple of the guys having some GI problems in the middle to second half of the course, we finished the event as a complete team. Those digestive problems cleared up eventually and we finished strongly.

Not sure about the other team's results yet, but we were the first team in ahead of an incomplete team about 30-40 minutes after us.

We finished in 16h 14min. This time was a couple of hours slower than our goal of 14 hours, but the GI problems put paid to that. It is also about 35 minutes slower than last year's Power of four time. I think it was a pretty good time given the problems we had on the day, plus the fact that we hadn't run together as a team before the event. It's also not too bad for my first 100km event. I felt like I could have gone quite a bit faster on the day and could have run a lot more of the course instead of walking, which is a good sign for future events.

Overall, I'm very happy with the result, and I had a great time over the whole day. I didn't have any 'moments' out there which is largely due to the efforts of the support team for continually shovelling food and drink into me - thankyou Murray, Darryl and Tim (and Dad for picking us up in the morning).

After the event, RunCarly picked me up and we went home. Thankfully we had the kids staying with grandparents. In the morning we went and picked them up and I went for a swim at Aldinga Beach which did wonders for the aching legs. Today the legs feel tired and heavy but not too sore. I still have a bit of a sore throat and sniffly nose (made worse by the bad hayfever conditions in Adelaide today), but I should make a full recovery by the weekend.

So there are my thoughts about the event. Now I must get back to work.

But before that, here is a photo of the team before the race. L to R back: Me, Tim (support), Murray (support), Steve, Erik. Front: Phil, Darryl (support).
And me before the race.