Introduction

Welcome to my blog. The title originates when my primary athletic activity was competitive walking, but now that I am back to running it also includes that.

Not all content is accessible from the main page: for example, the rogaines, racewalking, and ultramarathon pages all include content that is only accessible from those pages.

Ultramarathons

Ultramarathons are any event longer than the standard marathon distance of 26.2 miles / 42.195km. Standard distances for ultras are 50km, 50 miles, 100km, and 100 miles. There are also 12 hour and 24 hour track runs, and multi-day "stage races".

I have currently (September 2012) completed 30 ultramarathons, plus 1 DNF at about 66km at the Molesworth Run. Reports for most events are provided below.

See also

Rogaines

Rogaining is the sport of long distance cross-country navigation. Events can be as short as 2-3 hours or the standard 24 hours. Teamwork, endurance, competition and an appreciation for the natural environment are features of the sport. Rogaining involves both route planning and navigation between checkpoints using a variety of map types.

GN Phillips and RJ Phillips, Rogaining, 3rd ed, 2000


The two main umbrella organisations for rogaining in New Zealand are: My reports for selected events are provided below.


Hiking and Mountains

The Hiking, Trail Running, and Mountains pages are all inter-related, but with some subtle differences:
  • Hiking is not an organised race, and may include Coastal Adventures, activities in the Mountains, and hiking in other locations;
  • Trail Running covers organised events, some in the mountains, but others on local hills and trails; and
  • The Mountains category covers both events and hiking in various places that can be classed as mountains.


    • Racewalking

    Racewalking only has to meet two technical requirements:
    • no loss of contact, as judged by the human eye; and
    • the leg has to be straight from the moment of first contact until it is upright.
    More detailed rules are here.

    I'm not particularly good at racewalking, often falling foul of the straight leg rule. But I still give it a go and here are the results of my endeavours.


    Running

    This blog is primarily about my walking activities, but sometimes I do run. Here are reports for events where I have run.

    Shorter Races

    I classify events as ultramarathons, marathons, rogaines, and "shorter events". So a "shorter event" is just something that is shorter than a marathon and is not a rogaine. Consequently there's a mixed bag in here: running, racewalking, half marathons, 10k and 5k races, , etc.


    Sunday, January 22, 2012

    Latham's Track

    Te Tiringa trig
    At Te Tiringa trig, Whale Island behind
    Latham's Track is a short loop of about 6km near the small Eastern Bay of Plenty settlement of Awakeri. The southern end of the trail starts/finishes in the carpark of Awakeri Hot Springs Holiday Park. The Holiday Park shop is a great place to buy an iceblock on a hot day, and the Park's hot pools are also open to the public.

    We started from the Holiday Park and ran north along the road to the far entrance to the track. This direction provides a relatively gentle gradient uphill and a steep downhill at the end: the anticlockwise direction provides a very steep uphill to start, with a long relatively gradual downhill.

    Meadow
    Follow the markers across the paddock, then begin the climb up through bush, another paddock, and then more bush. After a series of climbs the track eventually breaks out of the bush at Te Tiringa trig. From here there are views across the planes below and out to Whale Island and beyond.

    The ridge undulates for about 750m, and along this section Mt Edgecumbe is visible in the distance. The track then heads steeply downhill, losing 145m of vertical height in just 400m of horizontal distance. Across a meadow, then the track drops again, although not nearly as steeply. The track ends with a 200m flat stretch finishing in the Holiday Park carpark.

    Mt Edgecumbe
    Mt Edgecumbe in the distance as we begin the
    descent from the trig.
    Running back across the meadow
    Nearly down, running back across the final meadow.

    Topo Map
    Posted by Andrew Shelley
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