Warrant Of Fitness - Brokeback Belmont

In sharp contrast to the Herculean efforts of many of the team in their far reaching North Island Cup campaigns, I have only been biking once since the Makara Peak Rally 5 weeks ago. And that one ride was a casual sift with Angry C-Dawg. I have been mostly trail running to build up my strength for first time running the Tararua Mountain Race. This is a 35km run across the Tararua Mountains from the Waiarapa to Otaki Forks. The total ascent is a shanksmashing 2250m and the total descent is even longer. The organisers confidently bill it as the "Hardest mountain run in New Zealand".

First time competitors must run as a team of two. I am running with my main man (and Best Man), Sam "Rammer" Dungey, who is an original Bushlove Racer, from our entry into the Muka Muka Munter as the Bushlove Racing Team back in June '08.

The event is the same day as Karapoti, so spare us a thought as you sip your latte's after the finish, as the very strong winners of the Tararua Race complete in a little under 5 hours. We expect to take wayyyyy over 6 hours. This is a concern as 6 hours is a long time to spend standing up watch TV, let alone running.

As part of the training we gave ourselves a Warrant Of Fitness exam on Sunday, in the form of our new Brokeback Belmont route. This heads from my place at Aotea, nr Porirua, up to the Belmont Hills to meet the dress circle. Then heads south via Cannons Head and Belmont Trig, down to Koro Koro stream and back up to Stratton St via Koro Koro Dam. It then climbs Middle Ridge to re-gain the dress circle and descends the same way we came up. It has many grinding climbs and long descents and was a great outing. The views off the tops were excellent and at times we had mint views each way across to Kapiti and away to the Orongarongas.

We tapped along quite well and gained Belmont Trig in OK time. The descent to Koro stream was steep in places and the fairly poor footing meant we couldn't pull back much time. The climb back out of the valley to meet the 4WD heading down to Stratton St, was steeper than the price of cheese. We cut a Danzig ascent off our original plan and headed up Middle Ridge, which was when our shanks first started to get the good news.

Click for the Garmin GPS stats....

By the time we got off the ridges and back down to civilisation, we were pretty broken, and finished the run over budget, in a time of 3hr 51mins. A very satisfying shakedown of our abilities though. We'll knock it off in under 3hrs 30 next time.

Although its not comparable to the rigours we'll face in the Tararua event, it was a great effort and certainly makes the run sections in the Crazyman and Porirua GT that we'll be doing, seem less daunting.

So there we go, something a little different from the norm'. Thanks for reading. If you are a biker who has never really run before, give it a try. Very rewarding stuff and a totally different way to enjoy the magnificent landscape that surrounds us in Wellington. Or if you don't enjoy the idea of your kneecaps popping off on long steep descents and rolling like saucers down the hill before you, maybe give this hill running a miss.

For funsies here is a little photoset of our Sunday endeavours

View towards Mana from the valley used to gain the Dress Circle

Rammer relishes crossing the windy tops

Trotting around the Dress CircleMore trotting around the tops

Rammer motoring up the ridge to Cannon's Head

Looking South from Belmont Trig - Our high point. Looking fwd to some descent

I make Belmont Trig my bitch

Rammer runs for the arches - In his fatigued state he mistook this for a MacDonald's sign and accelerated, rattling off his order to an imaginary drive-through kiosk

The very steep ascent from the Koro Koro Valley to gain the Trig 4wd. Being late for dinner and being a little tired, mean that is the end of the pics....