IT Consultancy and Adventure Racing

link:http://www.goldrush.co.nz/

After Dave Thorburn and I did this 3 day race as a team in 2006, and I ended up doing 3/4 of the last day due to Dave breaking his collar bone, I realised that the event was eminently doable solo. Early 2007 was a bit of a write off event wise, but when entries opened for the 2008 event, and Rachel had decided she was doing it in a team with her brother Jake, I had no excuses and an entry went in to spend the last weekend before Easter thrashing myself around the 348 Km Central Otago course.

Dave was also back for his first crack at doing the event solo, so with Rachel bringing down her mother, friend Kaz, and Jake's wife Amy to crew, there would be a reasonable little group of us spending 3 days based on the large loop around Alexandra.

The Goldrush has a great reputation as one of the friendliest races on the multisport calendar, and though it doesn't attract the cream of Multisport's elite, it does have a reputation as being a tough race, and the best of the lower South Island's racers would be there, with a lot of very good individuals competing both in the individual and team events.

Friday night's event briefing was interrupted by a local protesting about how all us awful multisporters were making the life of him and his family hell for the weekend so to 'stay the hell out of Russell St'. I'm not sure he expected the round of applause that he got ;-)

Day 1 was the uphill day, where we started off paddling down from Alexandra, before turning onto the Nobby Range with our mountain bikes, and climbing, climbing, climbing to the start of the run, which then climbs, climbs, climbs to the Upper Manorburn dam where we spend the night camped out with the rest of the competitors.

The individual men were in the 2nd group to start, 4 minutes after the individual women and the Classic and Veteran men, and would then be followed by all of the team competitors setting off in 4 waves behind us.

Setting off from Centennial Park, the keen and eager competitors ran ahead, with about 7 in front of me, and about 15 behind. Arriving under Alexandra bridge I had to run past most of the kayaks to where Kaz was straddling my boat, and after changing into paddle booties I jumped in, we sorted the spray skirt and I was off chasing about a dozen of my class who had arrived before me, or transitioned faster than me, and a few of the previous wave that hadn't disappeared round the first corner yet.

After quickly passing 2 or 3 of my class, everyone settled into their rhythms, and 2 hours of pain began. Due to the paddle being relatively flat water, being the first leg of the event, and involving so many people being so close together, it is very fast, with everyone pushing hard, drafting off each other, and vying for position all the way.

About 2/3 of the way through the leg I'd been paddling with another Solo in a Total Eclipse for a while, and we were gaining on a train of about 10 people, involving a couple of other Solos, a number of Solo women and Classics when a group of 4 team members came past, in an F1, a UFO, an evo and a school kid flying along in a K1.

For some reason they were paddling 4 abreast, so I jumped on the back on the huge wash they were dragging along, and the Total Eclipse and I put some time into the group, before he dropped off and I managed about another 5 minutes clinging on.

As the 4 of them paddled off, the K1 gave up the ghost and paddled in just ahead of me until we turned the corner down to the Roxburgh Hydro, where the chop started picking up and the better surf characteristics of my boat allowed me to overtake and head in towards the finish, being passed by another couple of teamsters, and passing one of the solo women, and then as it chopped up really badly approaching the Dam, Grant Clifford who was floating alongside his F1.

The chop, and the experienced paddler upside down in the water improved my concentration somewhat, and I gritted and grimaced my way into the get out where the announcer thought I was part of a tandem team despite the fact that they wear yellow bibs and I was quite blatantly in red, so after letting him know who I actually was, I ran up the chute, through the finish and straight into the clutches of my super efficient support crew.

Having parked themselves right by the get out, I was out of my paddling gear, sat down to get my MTB shoes on, and a banana was in my mouth before I even realised they were there, and after a frantic few seconds of actiivity I was thanking them for their work and shouting at other people to get out of the way as I accelerated down off the Dam into the valley below.

Despite trying to maintain a decent speed while trying to get some food in, I was overtaken by a couple of teamsters and a school kid before we reached the bottom, and the turn onto the Knobby Range Road.

I had been here a couple of years ago in an Arrow 24hr race, so knew to expect a long slog up, it was just a shame that as well as the vertical challenge, today was also throwing in a reasonable headwind for good measure. Over the next couple of hours, though the vertical component did vary between upwards and fun, the wind was constant, and unfortunately I was either being passed by people much faster, or passing people much slower, so rode the whole thing on my own, which was a lot less fun than the team ride I had last time!

About half way through this ride we turned off the gravel road onto farm tracks, and after a ( very exposed ) section along the top, there was a great downhill over schist dropoffs and small ruts, where my full suspension and disk brakes saw to a couple of people on V-braked hard tails that had taken me out on the way up.

Riding back onto gravel roads, I followed a couple of support vehicles into transition, gave my bike to an organsier, and ran through to my support crew, that this time included Rachel as she was waiting for Jake to arrive so she could start her run. Again, I sat down and had Banana shoved in my mouth as my shoes were changed and I asked for some sun screen, helpfully supplied by a random other support crew member, and then I was into my inov-8s and heading out into the first run of the race, described at the briefing as "17.5 K of up with half a K of down into the finish". Thankfully this description was slightly off, as it was only actually about 16K up and 2K down, but it was still pretty horrific, especially at the temperatures that Central Otago gets up to.

Running out from little valley station I was told I was in 4th, 11 minutes down, so given the heat and the intensity of this run at the end of just the first day, I decided to not push too hard, so I didn't fry myself and ruin the rest of the weekend. Running out of Little Valley station over a small rise and into the next valley, I could see a couple of red jerseys in front of me, as well as a couple of team guys, and soon passed an individual on the steep, hot climb out of the valley - at this point I surmised I was probably 11 minutes down on the lead, not on 3rd as I had suspected!

The heat was nicely into the 30s, so I soon stripped down to just my race number as my sole torso covering - adding my shirt to the backpack full of polypro and other survival gear that it was looking pretty unlikely that I would be needing today!

After walking up the long climb out of the valley, I managed to get enough of a jog on to pull away from the 2 red jerseys that I had seen behind me, and slowly reeled in the one in front across the open farmland plateau that we had reached, to find that it was the lead individual vet who was going very strongly. After a few false summits I finally crested the last rise and it was just a quick scoot down the rutted 4WD track down the side of the hill into the campsite which was set up near the Manorburn dam, to the confirmation that I was going to be lying in 3rd overnight - behind Nathan Petersen and Dougal Allan - given they had won the 2day, and come 5th in the 1day Coast to Coast a few weeks ago, I wasn't too unhappy about that!

An afternoon and evening were very pleasantly spent at Poolburn dam ( other than the cold parts of the hot-cold cycles spent with my legs in the icy cold run off from the dam - the hot parts baking on the stream bank were very nice however, as was the massage ;-) ), restocking the nutrients and preparing for day 2 where I hoped the cycling focus with 1 short run would allow me to pull some time back on the leaders.

Day 2 dawned remarkably early, with a vehicle driving around the campsite shooing people out of their sleep and onto the start line, just for us to stand around for about 15 minutes in the pre-dawn chill waiting for enough light to show over the horizon for us to embark on the first mountain bike leg of the day.

Eventually the older men and solo women left, and then we were off, Nathan Petersen sprinting off the front, it was soon obvious why as we reached a locked gate and the closer you were to the front, the less hassle it was getting over it.

I hadn't ridden this leg before, with it's famous XXXXserpentine?XXXX section that apparently no-one has ever ridden, so I was quite looking forward to giving that a good crack, until I got there and it was pretty obvious why no-one's ridden it - it isn't really a track so much as a scour out of the hillside, incredibly rough underfoot and very steep in places, I acknowledged it's reputation was well deserved, and shouldered my bike.

There were about 4 open men in front of me, and by now I had passed most of the people that had started in front of me, and was starting to get caught by the faster team guys coming through, so when we got onto the tops I had some company and there was a small bunch of us riding along at a decent pace, so I had a couple of people to ask whether they had any gaffer ( duct ) tape when my seat fell off! Unfortunately they didn't, and nor did either of the next 2 support vehicles that I passed, so I just settled into a rhythm and accepted that I was going to be standing up for a long time!

I'm not sure how much time I lost on this stage, but an hour and 20 of standing up garners a lot of sympathy from other racers, which while nice, wasn't as useful as all of the single speeding I'd been doing recently in keeping me sane! You spend a lot of time standing up on single speeds, so luckily I was pretty well practised, and most of the down and uphill was actually OK, it was really the last 5 or 10 K along the flat gravel roads that hurt the most.

Arriving in transition I made sure that my crew knew they had some sorting to do later that day ( sorry if any young ears were in the crowd, they don't need to hear such terms ), and jumped on the road bike for the first really fast leg of the race.

I was soon passing weaker team riders, and catching back up to some of the solos, before I got in with a couple of team riders and we got moving quite nicely, picking up another solo and a couple of teamies, though I couldn't understand why the guy in ffront of me kept stading up - the luxury of being able to sit down while riding was not being lost on me at all!

This short leg allowed me to rehydrate ( it's a bit difficult taking your hands off the bars off road if you can't sit down ) and fuel up, but I was still feeling pretty shocking when I came down the hill intothe next transition, not bad enough to stop myself and another guy going off the front of the bunch, but bad enough to be glad of the sit down to change shoes.

Plodding out onto the run I could tell I wasn't going to be having fun as I slowly trudged up onto the Otago rail trail, feeling bad enough that I physically groaned at the sight of the last rise onto the trackline, though managed to push myself into a shuffle on it, and didn't quite slow to a walk. The rail trail was open and hot, but thankfully at least it was downhill, so I just concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, other than when crossing the 2 viaducts when I let myself be distracted by the scenery before getting back to my own little world of pain.

Passing Kath Kelly shortly before the end of the run I informed her she had plenty of time over the rest of the women's pack ( all of whom I'd passed on the first ride ), I caught back up to the leaders of the men's tandem competition, and another one of the solo men on the way into the transition onto the MTB.

My bike awaited me, with what turned out to be Rachel's seat post ( the benefits of riding the same bikes ), and with the seat nicely positioned, I just had to stop once to set the height up a little and I was away on the last leg of the day.

I was soon joined by tandem team of Malcolm Mcleod and XXXX, who helped me along to the start of the first climb along with another solo guy that we picked up, though he dropped off the back when a couple of team guys came through and upped the pace a bit. The first hill is just long and exposed, so I slowly slogged my way up it trying to chat to XXX though he was obviously feeling a bit fresher than I was as his conversation comprised mostly of complete sentences rather than my incomplete words.

Once up the top though it was worth it, Malcolm waited at the top for XXX and I headed off onto the undulating top track, getting some decent speed up on the downhills and trying to maintain it on the ups, chasing anyone that came past for a while, then it was into XXXX ? Thompson's gorge XXX, where I was nicely baked in the still air, approaching the final climb of the day.

Another long slog was started up, this time chasing a vet who had pulled away from me in the gorge and was still moving faster than me, so I was trying to keep him close enough to catch him on the downhill on the other side.

Having done this leg before I was able to console a school kid that I caught up that the huge hill in front of him didn't have his name on it as we were turning off before, and sure enough at the base of it we turned right and started a fantastic 11Km downhill.

After catching a team guy on the drop, he stuck with me and we passed the vet that had been scurrying away from me, zooming down the hill and across the farm tracks we came out onto the gravel road and I was lucky enough to have found someone that realised that team guys are supposed to help the solos out as much as possible, as he was happy just to tow me into the day's finish line, even being good enough not to ride off when I struggled up the couple of hills that preceeded the finish.

A lot more hot-cold cycling and massage was required that night, as my legs had taken far more of a hammering than they should have done on that first ride, but at least I was still in 3rd, though having lost time to both 2nd and 4th, I was now going to have to spend the 3rd day defending rather than attacking.

Coming back from my soak in the drainage ditch, where I'd run into fellow Wellingtonian Mike Sheridan who was here running as part of a team, Pat and Sue, a couple of friends from Wellington had arrived to say hi on their motorbikes, along with tales of the fight they had been involved in at a christchurch petrol station on their way down - ruddy off duty cops, can't take them anywherre ;-).

Day 3 was the one I was concerned about - I was entering unknown territory going into the 3rd day of a multisport race ( being much higher intenisty than an adventure race ), and as part of that I had never paddled a boat as tippy as my sharp on a river with that much exercise under my belt, so while the Clutha is very similar to harbour paddling, it was still going to be an interesting time!

Another early start was heralded by the organisers driving around with a train hooter playing out of their loudspeakers - very atmospheric ;-) The start time was worse for the support crew who had to be out of the transition area by 06:45, but thankfully our multi-vehicle setup meant that while Rach, Amy and Kaz headed off in the FART with the kayaks, Jake and I joined Anne in the Camper van for a while keeping warm before heading down to the ( again, delayed, standing around in the cold ) start. This was the first year that the race hadn't been held over the same weekend as daylight savings ending, so the timings were obviously a bit screwed up, hopefully next year they'll have it sorted.

Starting with a road stage today, we were being let off in groups of about 10, so after the women and older solo men had left, the first bunch of open men were away, including Dougal, and then a minute later my bunch including Nathan was off.

Nathan was obviously on a mission to chase down Dougal, and after shedding a few guys with the frantic start, there were 6 of us riding at a breakneck speed, operating really well as a bunch, just constantly rotating round, constantly on the tri bars, we flew past a few solitary people and small groups that had fallen off the bunches in front, and afterwe had got down to 4 people after about 40 minutes, we spotted Dougal's bunch in front, just before we hit a hill where I popped.

The other 3 pulled out a gap on me, and when we crested the hill they were about 50m ahead, maintaining the same speed, I couldn't close the gap until 3 team men came past and aI jumped on the back. They seemed to want me to do some work but I steadfastly sat on the back, pretty much at my limit jst holding on, we slowly caught back up to Nathan, joined up and slowly closed the gap up to Dougal, who was in a bunch of about 15-20, including the leading women and older men.

Just as we were about to catch this leading group, there was a heap of noise behind, and a team guy on a time trial bike came flying past towing about 30 people, and I found myself in a lovely big bunch able to pull me along nicely.

This bunch upped the pace nicely, and we stuck together for a while, with much shuffling going on, before we crested the final hill and it was a mass sprint for the transition down by the bridge in front of us.

The size of the bunch obviously overwhelmed the transition team, who couldn't handle this number of people arriving at one time, so I was left holding my bike for a bit before chucking it on the ground, and then standing in a queue for about 30 seconds to go through the gate, where Rach was waiting with my BA and I started my transition into paddling gear as I ran down to the boat.

Once again ripping the top off my Sustagen bottle too early, I sprayed it all over myself as I put my booties on and then it was into the boat, yelling at Kaz not to let go while I put my spray skirt on and then turned my paddle round the right way round before getting a shove out, and being off onto the river, following a bunch of people that I'd been riding with, and a whole heap of new people starting their competitive day.

Paddling straight into the sun wth the Clutha swirling underneath was thoroughly unpleasant, so I just tried to concentrate on keeping the boat upright, and headed straight towards any shapes that I could make out as kayakers through the glare, hoping to spot any nasty boils and eddies in time to reast to them.

The plan seemed to be working, and though I was wishing that I was in a Total Eclipse rather than a Sharp, the closest I got to that was bunching up with Mitch Murdock and a Solo Male in their Totals, not quite the same, but Misery loves company ;-) Mitch being a local was used to paddling this river, and was good enough to point out to me if anything was coming up of concern, but we tended just to potter on at a conservative pace, sharing the lead.

Taking a conservative line at Devil's Elbow, we passed Nathan being towed to the side, so I briefly entertained thoughts of taking 2nd place, but he came past about half an hour later, and I was more concerned about surviving this leg than chasing him, so just kept on keeping on.

The end of the Clutha drags on and on, with a number of hopeful sightings of the finish all being dashed before finally I was sure that we were approaching the transition, and about 10 minutes later eddied out next to Kaz who was remarkably obvious standing in the water wearing my Burkes jacket.

Into runners and I was off jogging along dirt tracks to the road bike, eating the sandwich and drinking the water I had been handed, jogging along within metres of Mitch and the guy I had been paddling with, we all transitioned onto the bikes pretty effectively, me with the able assistance of Amy and then some random guy that carried my bike to the road for me while I put my gloves on - cheers fella.

Bunch riding is so much faster than riding alone that Mitch, XXX and I bunched up, Mitch just hanging on while we rotated in front, we soon started picking up other racers. We ended up with a bunch of 6 - 5 solo men and Mitch, which worked perfectly for me, as I knew I had time on all the solo's except for Dougal and Nathan, so the more I could see, the higher the chance of me maintaining 3rd.

With a bit of coaching we worked pretty well together, maintaining a good pace by rotating about every half a K or so, we ate the miles up and even got a brief section of tail wind before the final hill before Clyde. Towards the top of this hill I found myself off the front with a small gap, so decided to push it a bit harder, riding down through Clyde, over the bridge and out the other side I was expecting the transition any minute. I was disappointed ;-)

There was about another 5K of flat, straight roads before the transition on to the final run, but it turned out I'd made the right decision as I kept away, and after a quick transition into runners I was off, intending on doing the last 10K without any food or water, just getting it over and done with.

Starting out on the run along the road, there was a red jersey close behind, which seemed to be catching, so I got my head down, and once through the gravel mounds and down ontot he riverside track I turned again to see empty space behind me, and decided that I wanted to keep it that way.

I was feeling really good at this point, presumably because I knew the pain was nearly over, and chatted to the couple of people that I met on the track, before leaving the river abd crossing over the Alexandra bridge. Back onto the river trail, and there was a red shirt in front and I was closing fast, doubly invigorated when I realised that it was another solo man.

Overtaking him on the inside line, I tried to put some time into him, and was soon overtaking a solo vet, who I slowed to chat with, confirming with him that I had just overtaken 4th place, so should be exactly where I needed to be to confirm my 3rd place overall.

The last couple of K revisited the Otago rail trail after leaving the river trail, so the run turned from pleasant and undulating to exposed, boring and flat, something to be endured, made only slightly more pleasant by a reasonable number of well wishers lying about how far it was to the end.

Eventually I turned left into Molyneux stadium, and it was the last few hundred metres trying to maintain a decent pace across the grass, past the decent sized crowd who welcomed me into the finish, and then it was all over - 18 hours 24 minutes and 15 seconds of pain over 3 days was over.

Rachel and Jake ran across the line together a while later, as did Dave, everyone pretty pleased that the pain was over, and on the main part pretty happy with the accomplishment.

Goldrush being a very socially oriented event, the prize giving consisted of 'tokens' for the podium finishers ( you have to win to get one of the cool Gold panning based trophies ), and then the handing out of several thousand dollars worth of spot prizes, Jake and Amy getting a new George Foreman grill for their new place, and then it was off to Queenstown and a few days off training ;-)

Many thanks to Burkes Cycles, inov-8 shoes, Go Fast sports drink and Fergs Kayaks for their ongoing support in helping me get to these events, and Kaz, Anne, Amy and Cush for their helping me get through this particular event!