Since a couple of 5,000m races in Feb I have been focussed on training for the 88km Comrades Marathon in South Africa in June. For those that don’t know it, Comrades is an iconic road ultra, selling out it’s 25,000 entries in a few days.

I entered the Canberra 50km as timing makes it a good hit out 6 weeks out from Comrades and Canberra makes for a great family weekend away.

Treated this as a ‘B’ race and just backed off for 3 days ahead of the event, reducing the mileage  a bit on those days (still a 110km week in total though)

This was also the perfect opportunity to give the Nike Vaporfly shoes a hit out as I plan to use them for Comrades. My first pair, I ran around 45km in total in them ahead of Canberra, including a 20km run and they certainly felt comfy but it was a bit of a gamble moving into a new show with little transition.

Race day
Up at 5am after a crap sleep (baby in room next door waking every few hours but been there and know what it’s like so no complaints). Half a banana for breakfast and jogged 3.5km to the start. Arrived just 20 mins ahead of the relaxed start. Just time to chat with Brendan Davies, Barry Keem and our own Lachlan on the start line. Noticed that most of the guys in the front two rows had Vaporfly’s on ! Nike are indeed a great marketing company ! Vlad (Shatrov) was on the start list but was nowhere to be seen.

Plan was to average 3:55 kms and just duck under my PB of 3:18 but without damaging the legs too much, although with Aussie national medals up for grabs I was also keeping an eye on that, having previously claimed a 1st and 2nd in the national champs. With the quality of guys around me that was an unlikely prospect however this year.

Off we went at 6am and Ash, Brendan and Barry soon pushed ahead, with Lachlan and Phil Balnave not far behind. I sat at the planned 3:50s and was on my own within 2km.

We completed the first 7km of loops and then merged into the marathon field soon after they had started.

Lost sight of Lachlan and Phil and started weaving through the marathon field, past the various pacing groups. I paused for a bit to chat to old HuRTs member Tim Cradock and wish him well, he hasn’t been running much but had decided to do Comrades, found a substitute place and now wanted to muscle his way around a sub 4 marathon to qualify.

Took my first gel at the next water station and relied on carrying my own as had never tried the ‘winners’ brand on offer at the aid stations  (apparently Cadel Evans uses them !)

Kept the kms ticking over and felt pretty good. Kept pushing through the marathon runners and then we looped back to join the half marathon field. Cheered on Brendan, Charlie etc and then saw Elle just up ahead. Went through 21.1km in just over 82 mins and felt good and planned to hold for a 2:45 marathon.

Picked up the pace a bit to hold on to the half field around me and slowly pulled up alongside Elle and said hello (didn’t get much response though!). Soon the half field turned and we continued on for an extra out and back section. Got a bit lonely here but I could see 5th placed Phil ahead so started to real him in.  As we returned we hit the wall of slower marathon and half runners and I had to start weaving through way too much. Shouts of ‘keep left’ were no use to the hordes with earphones in. Lost a bit of time stopping to high-5 the family but was worth every second and for the first time in 18 yrs Courtney (wife) actually captured a few decent photos of me !!

Got going again and soon pushed past Phil. Was great to see Lachlan had been pushing up through Brendan and Barry but they were too far ahead for me to have any thoughts of catching. Went through the marathon in 2:45 and felt good. Kept the gels flowing every 7-8km or so.

Pace dropped just outside 4mins per km now and hammy felt a little tight, pretty sure the Vaporflys put extra pressure on the hammy so rather than dig deep I just enjoyed the atmosphere and encouraged the marathon runners around me.

Cruised on to the finish line for 5th and a solid 3:17. Not too bad for a 45 year old. First old dad over the line again, I’ll take that.

Great to catch up with the Hurts contingency at the finish line and awesome to see Lachlan had finished strong in second and with a cracking time.  I was planning to run with him at Comrades but on that form he’ll be on his 4th beer by the time I cross the line !

Another good weekend in Canberra, I think the 3 hrs in Questacon took more out of me than the race. Next up the May 10.

By: Andy Heyden