Tena koutou,

Mt Montgomery -Peak #21

A Christmas Eve adventure- oh what spectacular fun!

For those that have not heard the three words; Old Ghost Road

This is a magical trail through Aotearoa’s West Coast bush- access to this area is a true gift we have been bestowed.

Mountain biking 18km up the encouraging gradient to the Saddle of Lyell,

Enshrouded by gorgeous green bush- one could not help but smile.

And then came the lookout from the magnificently situated Lyell Hut,

And then the wee surprise of a less gentle climb up!

As we climbed out of the bush and begun the traverse

“We are so lucky to be born in NZ”, “holy moly”, “WOW” were the words we did converse.

The outlook was so stunning it made us stop and stare,

We felt so very grateful to be fit and healthy enough to spend Christmas here.

Mt Montgomery was a slight hike detour off the MTB track,

To add to the enjoyment of the view we enjoyed a Marshmallow Santa snack.

Looking out along a narrow ridge to the next part of the track,

We deeply inhaled in amazement- how did people build that!?

We waved goodbye to our outlook; 1332m above the sea,

Skipped back down to our MTBs,

Then tackled that grand trail we did see….YIPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Til later this week when I get up to date with my peaks,

Reta

Tena koutou,

Peak #22 – the last one of the year,

Located in Devonport- North Head boasts both a natural and man made vista

Rangitoto Island and Auckland city- can both be seen here.

The outlook up north is so different to the peaks in the south,

Pōhutakawa trees abundant around the Hauraki Harbour mouth.

Twas a leisurely stroll with the Thomas family out in the late, afternoon sun,

After we descended from the great heights of North Head, at Narrowneck Beach we swum.

Amazingly this peak/beach combo is just five minutes walk from their front door,

A view to a volcanic island on one side- and on the other skyscrapers galore.

Til later this week,

Reta

With it drawing closer, I thought I would pen some thoughts about The Pioneer which some people new to the event may find interesting, and what other people can add to.

Yikes, so much has happened over the last few weeks/month so this could be lengthy.  Firstly I got to do my first run with my sister which was a very cool event and was stoked to share this memory with her.  The run was the 10km crater rim, essentially up and back down Rapaki.  I had some goals… the biggest being to push my mind and to keep going. Well I smashed that out of the water and finished feeling great.

The following weekend was the first big hike and kayak adventure for me and Mike. First up, a kayak from Lyttelton to Quail Island straight across the harbour.  This was mine and Mikes first real experience with our kayaks in the waves and both handled well.  I felt completely stable, although very wet, as the waves came crashing over the front of the boat. It was very entertaining to watch Mike disappear between each swell.  It took us about 2 hours return as we were straight into an easterly and choppy 1metre swells on the way back.  The most entertaining thing about this trip was the lack of water around the back of Quail Island.  Happily paddling along, out of the wind to discover I was ‘beached as’ and had to drag my boat in the middle of Lyttelton Harbour, in ankle deep water. This best thing about this trip was the confidence I got going into our Grade two.

The second adventure of that weekend was Richard had us going up Mt Oxford. The plan, to take our time and enjoy the spectacular views.  Wow! How can I go 35 years and never know this place existed. The hike to the summit took us through spectacular scenery and then out into the snow line where we hiked another 20mins in the snow.  Snow angels was definitely a must! The loop with a few wrong turns, but some stunning waterfalls took us just over 6.5hrs.(walking).  But man was I sore the next day and a couple of days after that. Mike however took a good week to recover.  

Grade 2 Kayak course. This was 3 weeks ago. This certificate is required for the Coast to Coast and without it, all this hard work would be for nothing. It was a 4 day (2 overnights in the Hurunui) course and I was absolutely exhausted by the end of it.  Everyday we were kayaking in little whitewater kayaks for 8 hours.  The first day was in a pool for rolling and basic survival then out to a lake to practise using the kayaks.  These are hard to manoeuvre and I became very frustrated, very quickly at how fast they turn into a spinning top.  The second and third day had us on the Hurunui, where I spent most of my time upside down! Myself and Hurunui become great enemies, but slowly I managed to workout how to work with the river instead of against it and slowly the relationship become more friendly.  The third day was a little more successful and would have stayed relatively dry if we weren’t actually thrown in the river to practise survival situations and 101 rolls. Another river run and although I still don’t feel like I know what Im doing, I did get the certificate in the end.  The week was meant to finish with the mission mt somers race.  But with an aching body and pure exhaustion we decided to pull the pin.  I wasn’t in a great mental space and this may have just broken me. I was having many thoughts of whether I was ready to compete the Coast to Coast.

Over the last couple of weeks we have continued with a lot of fitness based training.  Multiple kayaks up the avon and a bike ride from Lyttelton to Diamond Harbour (which if you remember I did in late August and found really hard). This time Mike and I managed this trip the whole way without stopping and knocked 40mins off our previous time! We were so stoked.  We also did the first Team CP Crossfit class – a lot of fun and a CP group ride, again a lot of fun especially with all the hill fitness.

And finally Im at the end… yesterday Mike and I tackled Mt Somers.  Mission, to run all the flats and downs, and eat/consume 50g of carb every hour.  This was the first time I had really tried gels and although yummy the kick I find makes me dizzy for about 5mins, I will get used to it though. Mike and I biked for an hour beforehand to the other end of the track and started. It’s fair to say it’s a rather steep climb to start off with, but we were definitely rewarded with the views at the top. Waterfall after waterfall!! The rest of the run wasn’t too bad with a few difficult climbs, rain, hail and sunshine and a few river crossings (a first in our training). We managed it in 4.5hr, an hour faster than I had predicted.

We have only 4 weeks until we go away on our big Europe adventure.  In that time we have 2 kayak races – one this Sunday and then the big one which takes us down the Coast to Coast course on 11 Dec.  I am incredibly nervous about these. Finally I hope everyone has faired ok after the earthquakes, Tsunami evacuation. Im also coming up to a year since prognosis so have scans etc coming up as well, hopefully all this exercise has had a positive effect.

Ok, so after a quick read of my previous post Ive realised Ive got a lot to catch you all up one. The first exciting news is 4 weeks on from breaking my finger I am now typing with two hands!!!
It has been about 3 weeks since my last post and with the school holidays being in play, I have a lot to talk about.  Mike and I have been on many 3 and half hour walks (being thats all I could do) and have the Mt Pleasant – summit road- Sumner – Ferrymead walk sorted. Most of our walks even had us with our heads in the clouds!! We are now at the point where we are running down at great speed, until we hit the flat of course. I also did Mt Isobel in Hanmer with my wonderful friend (that is coming to Florence for New Years), Kellie. We hiked up to the top and got to take in the incredible views, and snow, I really felt like I was on top of the world and then enjoyed the very quick run back down!! Its fair to say though that that was the hardest walk I had done and it took a good 3 days for by poor, obviously underworked legs to recover. Mike and I had also been on a few good wee runs and have managed to find a good speed that we can both cruise and talk at.

Cycling outside and kayaking unfortunately had to take a back seat while my poor wee finger healed. But of course I was determined to make the most of the down time and work on my strength. With the wind-trainer set up in front of the TV and some Good Wife episodes to watch I started interval training and strength training. I have grown to love the determination required for the wind trainer and find it a lot harder than biking outside.

This now leads me to our first duathlon. A 35km ride followed by a 14km run. This was going to be the first race where I could practise nutrition and the transition. Richard and I had put together a plan and should everything go the way we wanted with my finger (removing the splint so I can actually brake) I was ready to go. The goal to finish! Now for the last week I have been trying to sum up this race in the most diplomatic way. Yes I managed to do it and finish it so goal achieved. Yes I learnt a lot, like, I need to eat and drink or I hit a MASSIVE wall that I struggle to get over and I need to get over the fact that someone has to be last and that may be me. No I didn’t enjoy it. Actually thats not completely true and although we had a head wind both ways on the bike I really enjoyed this part of this race and felt stronger and fitter, which is ironic because this was the part I was so nervous about. The run however, well that was mind game after mind battle and I really don’t think I would have made it to the finish line without Mike willing me on, my parents willing me on and of course Richard, my coach. (glad I convinced Mike to do the Coast to Coast with me).
On the kayak front I have bought a kayak and will hopefully get out next week, now that I have been given the go ahead from the doctors.
On a side note my finger is quite entertaining at the moment. It is stuck in one position and with all my might I can not move it. I look very posh with it stuck out. We are hoping this isn’t permanent and with some exercise it will hopefully start moving again.

Finally in the next couple of weeks we have our grade 2 kayak course (eek!!!), mission mt somers (21km trial run/walk/limp). We also have the crater rim this weekend which will be my first run with my sister so very excited – goal is to not give up. And of course lots of little finger exercises.

4am – We were all up and completing our final race preparation. I was really excited and looking forward to racing with my Wellington teammates Nicole Ranger and Marta Zanetti. We were giving Marta her first taste of adventure racing and the course looked interesting. Mainly I felt that the hills looked smaller than last year and the navigation looked trickier with plenty of route choice. We set off on the hour drive to start line. The ‘kiss and drop’ really was that and we jumped out of the car, said our farewells and headed to the start line.

6am – It was start time! It was a short fast 1km run to the rafts. Craziness broke out at our raft with confusion over people taking the wrong life jackets. We were so eager than we nearly left without our raft guide! It was a long paddle this year so we kept a pace steady. We had some tussles with the raft in front of us, eventually took them down which meant our raft was sitting in 3rd place.

Off the raft and onto the mountain bikes we went. It was a short ride mainly along four-wheel drive tracks. We had a smooth transition from the bikes onto the trek. This was the stage where we really had to watch our navigation. Nicole was our main navigator, I was the backup navigator and Marta was on the control card clipping. We focused on the navigation more than speed through this section. It started to rain but it didn’t really bother us. At one point we ended up in a big clump of people. We made a good route choice to check point N where I took the front and bush-bashed a path through for the team. This put us in front of the big bunch of teams.

After a steady trek, we headed off up a hill on our mountain bikes. It was tricky deciding the best track to take. We decided on the four-wheel drive track, as the tracks would be slippery after the rain. Little did we know the chaos there would be – there were tones of teams from the 3hr and 6hr races (we think). We were trying to ride around them, which was difficult, and often ended up walking our bikes. It was chaos. We had some fun on a single-track section to get to control point 1 and the dam. We had a bit of confusion with the navigation after that point but eventually got back on track. Once we hit the downhill section it was AMAZING!!! It was super super muddy from the rain and the other teams which had been through. We decided the best way to ride it was to apply the ‘no braking rule’ thus meaning we were speeding down the hill like crazy! It was super slick and quick, sometimes it got difficult to see when you got mud in your eyes and then you would just hope for the best. I enjoyed a bit of a crash when I had to slow down for a slow rider on the line I needed to avoid hitting her…..so I hit the breaks knowing I was going to skid and hit the ground. A lot of the 3hr and 6hr teams were walking bikes down the hill or going down slowly. We just flew past them. By the end of the ride, Marta and I decided we were officially mud monsters as we were covered head to toe in mud!

Marta, Nicole (hiding just behind) and Rachel

We clambered through a nice ditch into the transition, which cleaned us up a bit. The last run went reasonably well except the first part where we weren’t very well sorted and focused on the navigation and tried to go the wrong way! The run was a nice leg to finish on as we could get the controls in any order and we ran through gorgeous Podocarp forest and along the beach. We kept a good steady run pace going. I navigated this section with Nicole helping. We got to check point 20, luckily Marta remembered to clip it, before we jumped in the raft and had a speedy paddle across the bay. From here all we had left was a run along the beach to the last control and the finish line. It was challenging running along the beach but also a cool way to finish. We made it to the finish in 10hrs 15min finishing in 4^th place in the open category and 6^th place overall. We were stoked! It was an epic race with a good variation of stages. We raced well for a team that hadn’t managed to train together and Marta and I had only really just meet. Our support crew did an awesome job – they were so focused they didn’t manage any photos and cleaned our muddy bikes and gear!

Now its time to recover and complete lot’s of assignments. Then I’ll turn my focus to training for GodZone Pure in February 2017.

Rachel, Nicole, Marta

Unfortunately this is going to have to be short as Im writing with one hand, but I’ll get to that later. The last two weeks have been really exciting as the training has really started to ramp up.  We have been kayaking twice thanks to Arawa Canoe Club, which have given us some fantastic tips on correcting our stroke.  The highlight though, finally using a kayak with a rudder and pedals, which I is definitely needed on the Avon I think, especially with the amount of rowers, whitebaiters and geese to try and avoid!! Feeling a lot more confident in a kayak though and looking forward to doing our grade 2, although this has now had to be pushed out 5 weeks.

Richard also had us back up in the porthills with instructions of going off track and exploring! I was quite tentative at first but after a couple of hours I settled in and found my rhythm.  The views are quite spectacular!  Our last few weekends have consisted of this and Mike and I have really enjoyed getting out and about! Our weekends have also consisted of cycling.  With our first CP group session last week.  It’s fair to say this really killed me.  It was the first time I have truly wondered whether I can do this.  We were warned that we were in for quite a challenge but I had no idea quite how extreme.  We were to bike up Mt Pleasant across the top and back down Dyers Pass.  So now come the excuses… my legs were already sore, I have done very little hill work,  and Im still getting used to cleats.  Unfortunately all of these excuses resulted in not making it to the top, and my legs being so jelly I couldnt even enjoy the ride down.  I had to walk!!! OUCH. This however was the wakeup call I needed and I decided to put everything into the follow week!

So the weekdays have consisted of short runs which have been great and Ive loved having Mike run with me, I am a lot faster with him there to motivate me.  We have also had 1hour bike rides.  One was in the storm we had, which although mad, was good fun, another was along summit road, again it was a challenge but doable and the other is the reason I am typing with one hand!

It was Thursday just been, I had biked to Rapaki, ran up rapaki (with multiple stops) and was on my home when I suddenly found myself on the footpath with a little finger at right angles. (bike wheel got caught in the railway tracks and I went flying).  A trip to A&E and what I thought was a dislocation is actually a clean break in two!!! 5 weeks in a splint where I cant move my fingers! DOUBLE OUCH. But although Im wounded again, Im not out, in fact even more driven to knock this off the memories list (bucket list). We managed two, 3 hours walks (one up around Godley heads) this weekend and a strength workout and all with keeping the arm elevated – only condition the doctor gave me.

A massive thank you to the 3 cars and cyclist that stopped and waited with me, to my brother Euan for dropping everything and driving me to the hospital, mum for staying with me through although the x-rays and straightening and of course Mike for keeping me motivated!

So  a little bit about me.  My name is Millie and I unfortunately have been diagnosed with terminal Kidney cancer.  The Coast to Coast is on my bucket list and with the help of the Kathmandu Coast to Coast and Richard I will get to the finish line.  I have been completing a blog, and Richard suggested I start one here. So here is my latest post.

This blog is going to have to be summary of everything that has happened in the last 6 weeks or so.  Training has definitely picked up and its getting really exciting.

The biggest thing is that we have officially signed up for the two-day individual Coast to Coast!! Eek, there is absolutely no more excuses.  So where do a start… (ok I needed to go back and read my last post..I really need to write more) The weekend after my last post Mike and I went for a first two big adventures. A 2 hour walk through the porthills and a bike ride for an icecream.

Lets start with the leisurely walk through the hills.  Our mission – set by Richard of course was to get lost.  Well that we did and somehow ended up in Governors Bay.  Turns out walking down is a whole lot easier than walking up  and unfortunately what goes down must go up… so once we got to Governors Bay we went hunting for a track back up. An hour and half later, many stops, swearwords, and sore legs we made it back up to the car.  Sunday was going to be a first hill ride. What was with this weekend and hills. With an immense fear of going down hill and losing control we took off from Lyttelton with the glorious promise of an icecream in Diamond Harbour.  So it turns out it wasnt the downhill I needed to be worried about, turns out thats a lot of fun. What isn’t as much fun…biking up hill! the first few were ok and we took it slow. By the end of it, its fair to say we had well and truly earned those icecream calories.

The next couple of weeks consisted of a lot of running in preparation for the Woodbourne Half and another big walk in the Porthills. I also had a great session with Richard on biking up hill. Some great tips by the way.  Anyway I was tracking pretty well for the my next Half and was looking forward to running with Mike and my sister Francie (who was coming over from Sydney).  In fact I was the only one running more than twice a week… and was quietly skiting that I was sitting at the top on the Nike App.  But it wasn’t to be.  The week before the Half Marathon I got a phone call from the hospital.  “Mrs Smith are you free Tuesday. We have had a cancellation.  Can you come in for your hernia repair”  So thats what happened. Tuesday came, two hours of surgery and a hernia the size of tennis ball repaired.  The rest of the week was an absolute write-off.  I was surprised at how sore I was.  I think in my head I downplayed the surgery (especially because the last 2 surgeries had been so big). I really thought I would be ok. Mike and Francie both completed the half in under 2 hours, and both with having only done 4 runs. A massive achievement by both. I was so proud of them and loved cheering them on.

So after 10 days of just walking, we have finally got back to training.  We got cleats on our bikes last week and spent last weekend getting use to them.  I haven’t fallen over (Mike has, completely forgetting he was attached..) and getting slowly faster at clicking in.

This week Ive walked everywhere and gone for a bike ride to Sumner and back. We have a kayaking adventure tomorrow and another bike ride.  Sunday we are back into the porthills, getting lost and exploring everything Christchurch has to offer!

Ive got a special mention tonight as well, welcome to running Dad.  Our next race, the Crater Rim, is going to quite a family affair, with Francie coming over again and Dad joining in.

So with our Coast to Coast entries now complete and training well on its way, its starting to feel more real and instead being scared I am really excited. Lets do this!!!!

Fo more background of Millie’s Blog follow this link 

I’m back!

Last year my BHAG (big hairy audacious goal) was to complete the Queenstown marathon, which I ticked off not necessarily in style, or in the time that I was aiming for, but got the job done anyway. For anyone who is contemplating doing this run – do it! Not only is it a beautiful scenic run, it has enough undulations and a wee hill towards the end to keep the run interesting and the mind focused. So, what’s been happening since then? I have to admit that after the marathon I was on a bit of a high for a few weeks and when I spoke to Richard to de-brief, I was all about ‘yeah lets do that again!’. I was busy searching around the Internet trying to find another marathon event I could do before Christmas. His advice was to see how I felt in a few weeks…. In reality what happened was the euphoria wore off and the body and mind remembered the physical and mental effort it took to achieve that goal. I was quite happy to toddle off on holiday and have a break from training and I enjoyed just running for fun without having to meet targets and also not ‘having’ to run for an end goal.

While on holiday I went about planning what my next goal would be. I decided to see whether or not I could do a half marathon under 2 hours – my previous best was 2:19. I always lament about how slow I am and get frustrated with constantly being passed by other runners so, armed with a training programme from Richard I did the St Clair half and managed to improve on my time – or maybe it was the free bottle of wine at the end that spurred me on…

St. Clair Run completed

I also joined the CP Tuesday morning run group which has been a very steep learning curve for me. I am in awe of the athletes in that group (they are my run heroes) and I have gotten quicker just from trying to keep up with their warm-up pace! Christchurch half rolled round in early June and I surprised myself with a new PB. About 16km into the run I decided that flat, asphalt running did not put me in my happy place, so the mental challenge was to suck it up and appreciate the fact that the sun was shining and there was coffee at the finish line. At this point my achilles was pretty sore and if someone had offered me a ride to the finish, I think I may have been tempted.

My goal for a long time has been to run an ultra (will start with 50km!) and I have decided to aim for completing the Tarawera 50km trail run in November. As I write this, I am 117 days away from achieving this goal. Watch this space to see how the plan and journey unfolds….