Last Sunday I participated in an event I’ve never ‘properly’ done before but it was always on my radar – the SARRC Hills To Henley, a 30km run along the length of the Torrens Linear Park from Athelstone to West Beach.
One of the first running events I ever did was the 2013 Hills To Henley, in my first year of running. At that time there was a 15km option, an out-and-back from the finish line, heading up the river towards the city. It was the longest distance I’d ever run and from memory I did it just under 1 hour 15.
Then in 2016, while major works were taking place on the path, the event was re-branded as ‘Henley to Henley’, again an out-and-back but this time I did the full 30km distance as part of my training for the Adelaide Marathon. Those who ran it or volunteered at it will remember the atrocious weather conditions!
I had always wanted to do the ‘proper’ Hills to Henley but each year there was some kind of diversion from the ‘proper’ course. (Even this year there was a slight diversion near the end – one of these days they will finish the works on that path!)
Last year I had intended to run it, I didn’t end up doing it for various reasons, and in any case it was quite a changed course, finishing at a different location, so even if I HAD done it, I would have felt obliged to do it again! (On that day I did a 35km run by myself and ended up running my fastest ever 30k as part of that, so I probably should have entered!)
This year, probably about a month out, I saw it come up on my news feed, and as I am currently training for a marathon and totally NOT enjoying the long solo runs, I figured it was a good way to get my long run in with some company!
(The timing of the event, 4 weeks out from the Adelaide Marathon, means it sits perfectly in a marathon training programme. I expect that the majority of people who do this event are using it as part of a training programme.)
I had a relatively easy week leading up to the event, I didn’t do my usual caffeine detox, mainly because I forgot until Friday. I had a few things on that meant I didn’t do as many gym sessions as usual. I did get my regular monthly massage on the Thursday before, which was a total coincidence as I had made the appointment even before I’d decided to do the event!
I broke one cardinal rule of Run Club – don’t ever wear new gear on the day! I had bought a new pair of running shorts, and I hadn’t had time to test them out on a run prior to the event (in fact I took the tags off as I was getting ready on the day!). I had, however, done a couple of long runs in a pair of the same shorts, which I’d bought second hand and really liked except that I wasn’t super happy with the way they fit, so I’d gone with a slightly different size. What I did like about them was the plethora of pockets – very useful for long runs!
Those who know me will know I typically don’t put too much effort into my appearance, but when it comes to races I do consider what the photos are going to look like. My long run fuel of choice is small protein balls, and I needed to find a way to carry them that didn’t look like I had a bunch of hernias in the photos! These shorts thankfully have a couple of waistband pockets on the back, so I was able to stash the balls in there. From behind it probably didn’t look great but at least they wouldn’t be visible in the photos!
I had pizza for dinner the night before, I tactically ordered a 15” pizza so I’d have leftovers on Sunday night!
On the morning I had to drive to West Beach for a bus at 6:20am. Given the 8am start time, and not wanting my breakfast to be more than 2 hours before the race, I took my breakfast smoothie to drink on the road.
The bus got us to the start line at 6:55am, just over an hour before the start, which seemed to be a long time to wait but actually was not that bad. On the bus I sat next to a girl called Emma who was hoping for sub 3 hours (I later looked up the results and she ran 2:41 so I assume she would be pretty pleased with that!)
As soon as we got off the bus I got a sense of déjà vu – I had been here before. Not for a running event, but I once played soccer here against NAB (not the bank!). I can’t remember the details of the game but I’m pretty sure it was a cup game and they were several divisions above us so I presume we got flogged – hopefully today’s outcome would be better!
It was chilly but ideal running conditions – I started off with a hoodie and trackpants but eventually peeled off the layers – other than the brand new shorts I had on a T-shirt and arm warmers.
I was very happy to see that we had access to the toilets inside the clubrooms – if nothing else, so that we could get out of the cold for a little while! I did utilise the inside toilets but after not too long most of them ran out of paper so even though there were 5 toilets, only one of them had paper! Note to self – chuck a roll of TP in my drop bag next time! Thanks to the volunteer who went scrounging to find more paper – it was much appreciated!
I didn’t really have a time goal as such, but having run ‘Henley to Henley’ in about 2:35, 8 years ago in pretty bad conditions, I figured I should be able to do sub 2:30 (5 minutes/km pace). As it happened, there was a 2:30 pacer (there were a couple of other pacers too but he was the fastest of them) so I thought maybe I’d try to go with him at least in the beginning and then take it from there!
I had run the Greenbelt half marathon a few times, the Greenbelt started at Athelstone School and followed a similar course to Hills to Henley, but finishing in the city. But it had been quite a while since I’d last done it, so the start of the Hills to Henley came as a bit of a surprise, with a pretty steep incline right at the start. (The course is net downhill as you can see from the elevation profile, but plenty of undulations along the way!)
I had a look at my watch at the end of the first kilometre and it was 4:30, which was way too fast, so my response to that was to cover my watch with my sleeve and not look at it again until the end.
I managed to successfully grab a cup of water at every drink station, get (most of) it into my mouth and probably about 20% of the time I managed to get the cup into the bin! (Cardboard cups make drinking easier, I learned that in my first Gold Coast marathon, as you can fold the cup to make a ‘spout’ so the water can be more easily directed into your mouth).
I also had a (small) protein ball every 5km – just a few bites. I tend not to take on a lot of nutrition during a race, I rely on having a good breakfast (and pizza the night before DEFINITELY helps!) and then refuelling afterwards. Maybe not the best strategy but it generally works for me! It also saves me dealing with gels, having to time them with when I can get water, and then having to dispose of the empty packets (NOT on the path like I noticed a few people did – grrrr!)
Looking back at the results, my 20km split was just over 1:30, so just over 4:30 pace. I think this was possibly a bit too fast, as I definitely slowed down in the last 10k, and the last 10k terrain-wise is no harder than the first 20. I would actually have expected to go a bit faster in the last 10k as I had a Revvies caffeine hit at the 20k mark. I tried to let it dissolve without it sticking to the roof of my mouth, this was unsuccessful but I think it still did its job.
(Looking at my heart rate graph, it got pretty high towards the end, which makes sense as it definitely felt like I was working a lot harder by then, so I have some work to do to get my pacing and fitness right so I can finish more comfortably!)
Kind of ironically, my reason for entering this event (other than the sweet bling at the end, and not having to carry any water) was to have people to run with – and I ended up doing most of it on my own, at times not even able to see the runner in front! I was overtaken by a few people (not too many!) especially in the last 10km where I now know I was slowing down a bit, but on the flipside I did manage to pass a few of the half marathon runners, who had started at the same time, just about 9km further down the road.
The small diversion from the Linear Trail came close to the end, probably in the last 5km, and was actually quite welcome, as it was a nice distraction, and a change of scenery, a nice leafy dirt trail!
The last few kilometres was back on familiar territory, the course of the West Beach parkrun – I knew the end was ‘in sight’!
As I ran up the ramp and over the Seaview Road bridge, I could see a 2:15 pacer up ahead – the pacer was for the half marathon, but with both events starting at the same time, the 2:15 would also apply to the 30km distance – even though I was going to be a few minutes behind the pacer, it was still going to be a pretty big PB!
Only one small blip near the end where I was behind 2 girls and they ran off to the side and without thinking, I went to follow them before realising the finish line was over there – luckily it didn’t cost me too much!
I finished in 2:18:31 which I was very happy with! I was expecting to do about 2:30 based on my recent training runs, and my long runs have been slower than at the corresponding time last year, so it’s nice to know I can still pull out a fast one! Also, I needed to be at a function in the city at 11:30 so that was a little bit of motivation to run fast! This meant I didn’t get to hang around at the finish line which was a bit of a shame as it was a lovely day, looked like great vibes, and I knew a lot of people there. I only had time to grab my medal (once again SARRC have stepped up their game with the medals, I’ve been very impressed with the recent ones I’ve received!) and a quick refreshment before heading off.
(Side note and something that I won’t let go unmentioned – it was a pretty good day for me all round as later that day I went to see the Crows vs Hawthorn at the Adelaide Oval and the Hawks had a nice win – probably not the best thing for me to be doing with stiff legs, sitting down for several hours, but of course I’m very glad I went!)
Well done to all the participants in the various distance, and as always a big thanks to all the volunteers and organisers for putting on another great event!
Would recommend!