The Feral Pig 100 miler is a beast of an event. Over 4,300 metres of elevation on brutal trail in the searing heat of a Western Australian spring day. The best is saved for last after returning to the start line and then having to face the hardest terrain of the day in the 38k ‘death loop’ , normally attempted in the late evening or early morning when you are at your weakest. I have ran the Feral twice before , in 2020 I got my ass well and truly kicked http://www.runbkrun.com/2020/11/13/another-lesson-learned-ultras-teach-you-stuff/ ) but I returned last year and returned the favour, take tha ..read more

An injured runners weapon of choice, the Elliptigo. After the No Time to Die Ultra I was broken and on my first run post event , the Thursday morning  Yelo  run, I blew up 5km into the 10km morning recovery. The last 5km back to Yelo was painful and I could feel all my tendons and leg muscles taught and ready to rip or tear. I put this down to little or no stretching since the last ultra and also not drinking enough liquids. I made an appointment with my dry needling guru, Myree , and that evening found myself on her massage bed in the world of pain that is a decent dry needling appo ..read more

Melbourne tram, iconic image. The last couple of years my focus has been on ultra races, in fact my last 18 races over that period have all been ultras. My last marathon was the Perth City to Surf in August 2019, just breaking the sub three hour mark finishing in 2 hours 55 minutes and change.  I had entered the Melbourne marathon on a whim earlier in the year and I was determined to try and continue my sub three streak currently standing at twenty nine marathons over a ten year period. Seemed like a good idea at the time but then the ‘No time to die‘ backyard ultra was introduced and I h ..read more

Backyard ultra three in the UltraSeries ( https://ultraseries.com.au/ ) Grand Slam was the inaugural ‘No time to die’ Ultra in Adelaide.  Actually no one is sure what is involved in the backyard ultra grand slam we just know we have to run all four backyard ultras put on by the UltraSeries team, two in Perth and two in Adelaide. Currently there are five of us attempting this, myself, Jen , Renton, Margie and Nico. We have all ran the two WA backyard ultras, Herdy’s Frontyard ultra in March and Birdy’s backyard ultra  in August. How hard could another backyard ultra be ? There was a g ..read more

This Friday I take on the inaugural No Time to Die front year ultra in Adelaide. Another event put on by Shaun Kaesler and the team at Ultra Series SA ( https://ultraseriessa.com.au/ ) This will be my seventh backyard ultra and as usual I’m excited, why wouldn’t you be ? Anyone new to the backyard ultra concept it is a 6.7km loop on the hour , every hour until there is only one runner left standing, everybody else is a DNF, assuming the last runner does the final lap alone. Invented by Gary Cantrell, known as Lazarus “Laz” Lake, an endurance race designer and director. His races include the B ..read more

With adding my commute to work on the Elliptigo these last few weeks ( https://www.elliptigo.com.au/ ) I’m starting to feel fatigued on my lunch time runs. This, together with a full racing calendar stacked full of Ultra’s, is starting to add up and I took my first day off in a month last Sunday. Did I feel better on Monday, probably, it’s hard to tell these days. Last year was my hardest in terms of races and longest in terms of distance and I seem to be going harder and longer this year. With my 55th birthday in February I am now close to sixty than fifty and this is a sobering thought. Mayb ..read more

The most EPIC race I could find. Next year I have entered the inaugural running of the Run Brittania Ultra, yep , I’m going to run the length of the United Kingdom from Lands End to John O’Groats.  To say I’m excited is the ultimate under statement, I feel like a small child on Xmas Eve, only 100 times better. This race, over 35 days, yep, 35 days, one more time, 35 days, is going to be so, so cool. From the events website: This is a major physical and logistical undertaking, the entire distance is still fairly seldom attempted on foot in one sitting – and rightly therefore constitutes a ..read more

I have ran Birdy’s Backyard twice before and both times I had reasons to finish early. The first year, 2020, I was under struct instructions to be home early afternoon the day after the start, so I had a 24 hour limit. This was a pity as I struggled through the night but for the last few laps felt fresh as a daisy and my last few laps were by far my quickest.  I often wonder if this was my central governor ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_governor ) realising I was limited to 24 laps and reduced the feeling of fatigue as it knew I was close to finishing. No need to protect the ..read more

The stare that says ‘one more lap!’.. This Friday I’m taking on my sixth backyard ultra, the race with no end, runner against themselves in the truest test of mental and physical strength. The concept of Big Dog’s Backyard Ultra is simple: Runners have an hour to complete a 4.167-mile loop at the race organizer’s home. Then they do it again, and again, and again—breaking for food and rest only in the spare time before they start the next loop. Hundreds of miles and a whole lot of pain later, the last competitor still running wins Backyard Ultras are so popular and becoming more so daily. Jus ..read more

Perth Marathon 2016   As I continue my journey to the Melbourne Marathon in October this year I have been reading some of my old posts on racing marathons and sneaking under the holy grail of running, a finishing time of three hours. I have been on my marathon training for about three weeks now and this has mainly been adding in some faster runs three or four times a week , with a more aggressive progressive run on Thursday morning and then a tempo Saturday. All my runs have become faster and I am trying to become comfortable with being uncomfortable.  I love that quote , it sums up ..read more