10th of May for about 4 hours or about 25 km I got to be selfless. I got to jog, walk, push, pull and help another person go after their dreams in what can only be described as an act of pure insanity and Stubbornness.
However for the last 5 months. I have been living the life of a pro athlete. Living, eating breathing my training. It seems to be paying off as well. I have dropped nearly 13 kg since moving up to the Sunshine Coast. I am swimming faster than I ever have as an adult, running further and faster than ever before and riding as good as I was at the age of 35 when I was purely riding my bike for 13 plus hours per week.
My Remedial Massage business is being quite slow to take off. I am certain I am on the right path and have faith it will grow over time but presently I am really lucky I have Wendy upstairs working her butt off everyday. Keeping us fed and clothed and basically supporting an out of work business owner. Recently I was lucky enough to get a casual job at a local running/ triathlon shop and have been working there a couple of days a week. To tell you the truth those little shifts have been fun and getting to and meeting new people and selling them a quality pair of runners is quite rewarding. It also gets me out from under Wendy’s feet which is nice for her I am quite sure.
But for the most part. I have been studying and training and doing the occasional remedial massage treatment. Not all that stressful. It has really led me to close in on myself over the last month or so as I began to shy away from doing anything that wasn’t serving my purpose of my next race. (Really quite ridiculous when I think about it). Wendy and I came up to Sunshine Coast promising each other to do more to connect with more people and be social when ever the opportunity arose. Yet here I was falling in to old habits and routines .
Then along came Andrew Trout. A 58 year old local legend triathlete planning on tackling one of the most insane ultra endurance races in Australia. It is a 3 day event consisting of Day 1 a 10 km swim and 145 km bike ride, Day 2 a 281 km Bike ride and Day 3 a Double marathon. Yes that’s right 84.3 km run to finish the race off. To cap it off Andrew isn’t what you called optimised for ultra endurance. Now I am not saying he is over weight or doesn’t train hard because he is fit and in great shape. He does however have some stuff going against him that makes Swimming, riding and running a challenge. I won’t go in to them but just believe me when I say he is awesome.
Over a 3 day period Andrew was to be racing for nearly 36 hours total time. It is an epic event that only certain people with that masochistic not easily swayed from their task type of person even gets a little interested in doing something like this. Andrew ticks all of those boxes, multiple times if you ask me.
On days 1 and 2 Wendy and I went to the finish line and watched Andrew complete the day and had a chat to the rest of his support crew, getting to know them and getting a feel for the event. Day 1 Andrew was pretty deflated on crossing the line as the swim conditions had been extremely hard and had put him well behind his planned time schedule. Day 2 however Andrew had rallied and finished really, really well and was talkative and chatty with all those that had come in to see how he was going.
So where do I come in to this? Well you see on day 3 the competitors racing are allowed pacers. Team mates that run beside the competitors and feed them, hydrate them and encourage them to keep going, when every ounce of their being is screaming for them to stop.
I was to be the final pacer for the day. The team member that had the job to keep Andrew going for the final 25 km of the race. Prior to me there had been 5 other pacers all helping Andrew keep to a schedule. You see one of the cruel things about this race is that there is also a time cut off. Throughout the stages each competitor must make certain distance markers to be allowed to continue.
On the final day the competitors left Noosa at 5:30 am in the morning and were to head out around the river network around Noosa then south down to the tourist resort Twin Waters to the turn around. Wendy and I had a swim squad session the morning of the run so our plan was to hopefully get to see Andrew early on the run and then again as he passed through our village at Peregian Beach on is way south. Our timing was spot on as we got to see him running past with Former Pro Triathlete and owner and founder of the triathlon team I am a part of Callum Millward. The first kilometres on David Low Way are up and down hill the whole time with little to no flat ground to find a rhythm so keeping a reasonable pace while protecting the legs was a balancing act and vital for Andrews prospects of even finishing the race.
From there we jumped in our car and drove a few KM down the road to our home town, Peregian beach and waited for Andrew to roll on in. We were pretty happy with what we saw so far with Andrew holding up well over the early kilometres of the run. Our plan was to make Andrew walk the up and down hills and run a steady pace along the flats to try and save the pounding on his legs. You see most uninitiated runners would think that running down hill would be the easy section. Maybe, if you were only running for 10 km. But as the distance ramps up the damage that downhill running does to the legs begins to take its toll. So we had to really take care of his legs for as long as possible otherwise the damage to the legs could make things too much to bare.
From Callum another of our Triathlon team mates Jay Beckley took over pacing and his job was vital as he was in charge over the biggest hills of the day, Mt Coolum. Getting him over that and on to the nice flat section out to Twin Waters and back was one of the critical stages of the day. From there Andrews Fiancé Dawn and Friend Ian bot took turns pacing Andrew out and back to the second ascent of Mount Coolum. You see it is an out and back course so everything that Andrew went though in the morning. He had to go through again with even more fatigue and soreness in his legs. Kurt Schirmer was the second to last Pacer for the day. But to say that he was just a pacer would be the grossest understatement of the decade. You see Kurt did a lot of the training on the bike for this event with Andrew. He also did an Ultra distance Triathlon himself earlier in the year in Hervey Bay. He was also the team captain for the support crew. Which meant he had been running around all day every day since day 1 and then was meant to pace for 15 km on top of that it was quite a warm day 26 degrees about 85% humidity. Kurt’s Effort over the weekend is nothing short of monumental by itself.
My official duties for the day started out the back of Coolum. On a nice flat section and heading back on to the main road and back towards Noosa. Lets just put it out there right now. When I first laid eyes on Andrew. My first thoughts weren’t what pace are we going to run. They were I think I should really be calling an ambulance. He was now in an unresponsive state where unless you were critical to him. He didn’t have the energy or the concentration energy remaining to acknowledge you. It was really quite un-nerving for a few minutes. But gradually I got my rhythm beside him and we got in to our sway of things.
With in a few kilometres we had a pretty good rhythm going where I managed to convince him to jog for a little while, using landmarks like power poles and rubbish bins that were on the side of the street. Andrew had to keep moving and I had to keep my food and water and his food and water ready to go at all times. Mind you by that stage the mere act of taking in calories was becoming a chore as his throat was so inflamed that coke actually hurt his throat and pretty much all the carbohydrate drinks were tasting disgusting and upsetting his stomach. But as it was my job to make sure he didn’t pass out. It was a matter of getting nasty and forcing him to take in the calories required to get him home.
Once we got back in to my home turf we were joined by one of our Triathlon Team mates and crew member of for the female overall winner Mel Urie. Now this was awesome to watch as Mel is a seriously experienced ultra athlete herself. The way she talked to Andrew and picked up flaws in our strategy straight away enabled me to make some changes straight away and likely is one of the reasons we made it to the finish line.
Getting past Peregian Beach was a great feat. It signified 18 km to go. But also signified that the next 13 kilometres were about to start, and with Andrew being so monumentally fatigued. This was literally the hardest section of the race. For the next 12 kilometres it was constantly up and down short sharp hills that were hard enough on fresh legs, but the addition of 60 km of abuse on them just today made the task even harder.
From then on I don’t think I shut up for the next 16 km. It was a matter of barking instructions to Andrew, the rest of the crew, to bystanders and even to myself. As now the wheels that were still on had completely fallen off. The only thing that was getting us home now was the innate mental drive in Andrew’s mind that was saying I must cross that line. I honestly think you have to have done something completely insane like this to understand it for your self. Here was a man out on his feet that now couldn’t actually lift his own arms up to feed himself, somehow finding the energy to get up and down the coastal hills that line David Low Way between Peregian Beach and Noosa.
At some stage, I am not actually sure when. Andrew’s ability to slow himself down while going down the hills finally gave out. It was to a point that if not kept in check he would end up face planting on the bitumen and that would be the end of it all. So I decided to get in front of him and use myself as his brakes. So for anyone going passed it would likely have looked pretty comical. Some dude at the front trying to get down a hill with some semblance of control with a near catatonic dude with his hand in his back pushing him down the hill with wild abandon.
It was during this section that I had worked out that we weren’t going to make the time cut off for the day. But at that stage it was critical that we kept Andrew’s hopes alive. With so much fatigue in his body a crushing blow like that so far from home could just shut his willingness to push past the agony down. Now it was about completing the race and get him there as safely as possible. As we got in to the Noosa out skirts Andrew worked out the timing for himself. But to his credit he never stopped walking, never talked about quitting never faltered one little bit.
We did that final 5 km at the end of that day with me still nattering away in his ear and hounding him to open his eyes for a bit to look at where he was walking and gently as possible pushing him back in the right direction as he looked like he was about to careen of the track in to the bushes.
And so it was as we got towards the final bridge as we got in Noosa and getting ready to turn towards the beach, was where the rest of Andrews amazing crew were waiting for us. The entire support crew for the whole 3 days and all his pacers where there to complete the final kilometre with him.
Even now a few weeks later as I am writing this down remembering the faces from the crew and the feeling I got just from the realisation that we were going to get it done, is making me tear up. It really is hard to describe the pride and love and comradeship that I was feeling at that moment.
It was now pitch black and as we got on to the Noosa main beach we now had 600 meters to go. The chant of Let’s go Andrew, Lets go still rings in my ears now as I am typing this down and the rest of the crew talking and yelling encouragement as we saw the finishers flags come in to sight and started our way up the finish straight. There was yelling and screaming from the entire crowd that had assembled to see just what human spirit and determination looks like.
There was from my perspective a sense of what it feels like to be a part of something bigger than yourself to watch someone else cross the biggest finish line of there life and do it with grit and determination that was truly the most inspiring thing I have ever witnessed.
There is a photo of Andrews entire team after we all crossed the finish line line. It is a brilliant photo and it shows everyone of the group embracing and letting 3 days of emotion go. I truly think that photo will be the one iconic photo that I will use any time I am lacking motivation or drive to get out the door and train to complete my task that I have set myself to complete and chase that finish line feeling that I got that night.
My little part in the race and how I was able to contribute to a person achieving such a monumental task is truly one of the highlights of my entire life and will live with me until the day I leave this earth.
Thank you Andrew for the opportunity to help and thank you for helping me remember what it is like to be a part of something bigger than myself.
Mick