Twenty months ago this week, two sets of runners randomly collided in the most unlikely of locations: the dingy taproom of an outback roadhouse bar in the burned red centre of Australia. At nine o’clock in the evening, it was the only watering hole open in a patch of land about the size of Wales – last-chance corral for tired people in desperate need of a feed.
I was there, one third of a three-man team attempting to set a new record by trail running to the summit of the highest peak in each of Australia’s eight states and territories in eight days. With Ben Southall and Luke Edwards, I’d just legged it up and down the Northern Territory’s 1,531m Mount Zeil. Knackered and hungry, we were still on a high, having just jogged past the halfway point of our expedition. But then we met an Irishman who made our efforts seem like a run in the park.
Tony Mangan was on a one-man mission to run around the planet. He had begun by doing the Dublin Marathon in October 2010, after which he had crossed the Atlantic and just kept running, down though the United States, then Central and South America, and onwards, until our trails happened to cross. Australia was his 19th country, and when we met him he was closing in on kilometre number 30,000, and punching out between 60 and 70 clicks a day in brutal heat to get to Alice in time for his birthday.
Tony had just had a tiff with his volunteer support driver, and was busy winding up a load of heavyweight Aussie roadtrain drivers by telling them – in his Irish brogue – that their country wasn’t half as tough as they all thought it was. He should know, he argued, since he was running right across it. Good logic – wrong audience. Thankfully we all escaped without a kicking – us to run up Mount Meharry (1,253m), an angry red pimple that pokes out the top of the enormity of Western Australia, and Tony to continue on his globetrotting odyssey.
A few days later we finished our expedition with a sweaty slog to the ceiling of Queensland on the tropical flanks of Mount Bartle Frere (1,622m). Once I got my breath back I looked Tony up, and discovered our eccentric ultrarunner mate had previous. Serious previous. He was a multiple world-record holder – having set the bar for the longest distance covered during 48 hours while indoor running (426.178km), and the greatest distance run on a treadmill over 48 hours (405km). And he was still going. And going.
Last week, Tony finally completed his mission – returning from his 50,000km round trip in perfect time to run the 2014 Dublin Marathon – just as he’d always planned to do. And, almost at the exact time Tony was hanging up his runners and cooling his heels for the first time in four years, I found myself flying from London to New Zealand to meet Ben and Luke, about to put my expedition shoes on again.
Because, inspired by this superhuman runner serendipity had put in our path, Ben, Luke and I had planned a new challenge – one that would be a whole lot more gruelling than the Aussie 8.
We’d come up with the idea for the New Zealand 9 – another record attempt, this time one that will see us racing around New Zealand’s nine official “Great Walks” in just nine days. While numerically this is just one extra run to the Aussie 8, it’s going to be 100 times harder.
For starters, one of the Great Walks – the Whanganui Journey – isn’t a walk at all; it’s a river challenge to be done by canoe or kayak, and it usually takes people three to five days to complete it. In fact, all of the nine routes are really multi-day experiences, with track distances ranging between 32 and 145km. To finish the expedition we’ll need to run the equivalent of nine and a half marathons in nine days, and knock off a 145km paddle in the middle. It seemed like such a good idea a year and a half ago.
Frankly, the whole concept has been giving me night horrors for months, but we’ve told everyone we’re going to do it, and there’s no going back now. Not when the clock starts ticking tomorrow morning, when we’ll start running the 32km Rakiura Track on wild and remote Stewart Island. Tony had better be watching – this is all his damn fault.
- Patrick will be updating his adventure next week
- Follow Patrick on twitter at @paddy_kinsella
- Follow the progress of the NZ9 Expedition here
