Road tripping with Erika was a blast!!! We covered every topic you could possibly imagine and cried of laughter majority of the way. A few wrong turns and Sydney traffic at it’s worse, we finally made it to Canberra by dinner. Pasta with Son and Charlie, snuggled into our king bed  and 8.5hrs later Erika was waking me! 

We were pumped! Put our sparkling new Delta singlets on for the first time, coffee, electrolyte, banana, bliss ball, happy snaps and we were off.

3km warm up to the start line, checked in our bag in the Elite section (first time I’ve had an elite start!!) quick hello to the HuRTs crew and we jumped in to the front of the start. First person I saw was Milly Clark! Wow she’s impressive!!! 

One last good luck to Erika, a massive hug and we were off. 

First 8kms I felt amazing. Decided to go out hard and give it a crack. I felt super confident and with the marathon training in my legs, I thought I’d give it a go! I got to the 7km mark and saw Ian Johnston and then a Striders pacer. Thinking it was the 85 minute pacer, I jumped on the back. Lasted a whole 1 min then fell off! I looked up and realised it was the 80 min pacer! OH DEAR!!! My legs felt heavy and I realised at that point I had gone out WAY to hard!! I was definitely over excited! I tried to pull myself together and get back into a rhythm. Then Andy Heyden bounces beside me and dragged me along to the 9km turnaround. From 10-16kms I was hurting. I gave Strome a pathetic high five and tried to switch off and battle through, holding just over 4 min/km. The goal post kept moving. I started the race thinking I could get high 82/low 83 mins, which then changed to sub 85 mins, to just hoping I’d finish!! I just kept thinking.. I need to double this in 6 weeks times!!!! 

Back onto the bridge at the 16km mark I felt like THIS was the home stretch! I broke the race down to 4 Parkruns. This was the final 1! It felt like the longest parkrun I’ve ever done. I got to the 19km mark and I could hear Simon Wolznier knowing he had the 85 minute flag. I looked back and could see Erika. I knew she finishes every race strong and was waiting for her to motor past me. I felt like I was going backwards. Simon’s music was getting louder and louder. 1km to go, I just put my head down and pushed as hard as I could go!! The crowd was awesome coming into the finishing chute!!! Finally I went over the line in 84:36 7th Female and a 2 min PB. Completely exhausted! Happy with a PB and happy to finish. 25 seconds later Erika came in with a very strong finish 85:01, then Sonya breaking 90 mins! Some brilliant runs from the HuRTs guys and a few stand outs, Charlie and Brendan 75:XX Ben sub 80, Andy 3:17 in the Ultra and POTD Lachlan Oats in the Ultra 3:06!!! Unbelievable!  

Road tripping back with Ben and Erika finished off an awesome weekend away with the HuRTs crew!!!! Bring on Adelaide!!

by: Eleanor Goldrick