I’m a runner.

I used to say I was a trail runner, a long distance trail runner, to reduce the odds of someone asking my 5k time (it’s 21:57 from 2024 FYI 🤣).

I spent a lot of years trying, mostly in vain, to get faster at the half marathon and marathon. I didn’t know then what I had to do improve and change was slow if there was any change at all.

But then I found trails and it was new and fun and I didn’t care that I sucked because I was new and learning.

I learnt and I followed my coaches instructions and shockingly I improved! And given I live in the flat lands of western Melbourne where my vert is low and pavements are long, I thrived in relatively flat races. The ones with the coastal trails, the lake side trails and the forest roads.

I’d spend my downtime following mountain races on YouTube, looking at the mountains of Chamonix, Canaria and Cape Town and dreaming of finishing those races, knowing full well that going up was not in my skill set.

So I put it to the side, decided it wasn’t for me and focused on what I could do.

It wasn’t until an unexpected pivot back to the roads last year that I thought maybe the mountains could be for me.

With a little focus, better nutrition and super shoes, I ran a time in the marathon, 3:52, a 14 minute PR, that I never thought would be possible after trying for years to break that 4 hour mark and never cracking it.

Is there some special power in a fresh start?

Wikipedia says a fresh start is “a new beginning without prejudice”, but what if that prejudice, those skills and experience you’ve learnt from messing it up for 10 years, is the key to having success on that next round?

Maybe it’s not a fresh start, more of a tale of redemption.

I think it’s the change in the training that keeps it interesting and keeps the body and mind adapting.

So with that, we pivot, to the mountains! No more trying to get faster at the flat stuff, now we go up!

I expect the mileage will drop, the vert and strength work will increase and I’ll just have to deal with the anxiety that comes from watching my pretty Strava chart get less pretty.

I have a bit of a plan and I have Coach Ali for the rest!

First up is Ultra Trail Australia in May. Yes I said I was one and done with that race, but I also walked the entire back 25k so there is a lot of time on the table!

The race is big, in participation and in stair quantity.

101km, 4400m of vertical gain.

For context, Surf Coast Century is about 1900m of gain. Taupo 100k about 2000m of gain.

There’s a reason I’m not great at this, but it’s not technical in that it’s rocky or ridges or anything. It’s technical in that it’s a lot of stairs.

Then there is the GPT 100 mile stage race in November. 100 miles but over four days instead of one continuous push, a chance to see if I can actually manage the mountains before signing up to the whole caboodle or even a big European race. I don’t want to go all the way there only to DNF because I hadn’t prepared.

So now… we prepare. To the mountains