The Nugget 2012 - A Bit of Everything!

We are getting towards the end of the Total Sport Summer Series and to be honest they have been a mixed bag for me...

• The Tussock Traverse was great even with the couple of km's of road like trails. 
• The Trailfest at Riverhead was too hot and too dusty with too many roads for my liking. 
• I could see why the Coastal Challenge has become one of the major Auckland runs... but not for me, the slippery green rocks tied in with having to swim several times lead me to my first DNF ever. 
• I had to miss the Colville as I had Tarawera the next week... shame as I would really have like to run up there. 
• Then came the Dual... not helped I guess by me having run 60km for the first time ever at Tarawera the week before, I struggled bigtime and the scoria got the better of me... I finished, but very slow and very sore!

  The latest episode in the Summer Series was the Nugget Multisport Half Marathon event starting at Waihi Beach and finishing in Waihi town. With my bad run since the Tussock I was a bit worried... I need not have been. What a great event. As usual Total Sport had booked some sublime weather... I don't think they have had a bad day this series, even though it's been a wet summer.

Dropped the car off in Waihi Town to register and catch the bus and bumped straight into running buddies Steve Neary and Paulo Osario. Off on the bus down to the beach, just a 10 minute trip and then about 45 minutes of pre-race 'milling'. Met Kerry Suter for the first time (although I saw him in the distance several times at Tarawera where he was the running cameraman). 

Kerry bolted off like a gazelle at the start, took a couple of wrong turns and still won the race comfortably, hopped in his car and drove to Cambridge where he won another race in the afternoon, read about it here. 

Total Sports top Man Aaron Carter then had to put up with me telling him all the great things he 'could' be doing... he humours me, you have to respect your elders!

After Aaron's 'stirring' pre-race briefing we were off. I had run the first 3km at Christmas before veering off to the William Wright Falls and back. So I knew to pace myself for the ups and downs.  Second wind took a while but arrived eventually. As usual I was blitzing past a few on the downhills and getting passed by them again going up.

The scenery on the coastal section was awesome, the trails were by and large very runnable with just a few knarly bits. My Salomon Fellcross love everything except any sort of rocks, dry, wet, green it doesn't like any of them... so in a couple of places I was extra careful. 

The little dots next to the fence in the field

are runners.

The bump to the right of the tree is the Mount.

About 6.5km in and we turned left... and started climbing. My Garmin tells me that we climbed 250 vertical metres in just over 2km. All I know was it was hard work. Although it was a good excuse near the top to stop and take some pictures of the stunning views. It looks pretty good in the photos and yet they do not do justice to how beautiful it was up there.


After the first drink station - which doubled as a transition for the Multi-sporters - we followed a gravel road up a little further and then veered off into farmland for the next few km's. A rapid downhill allowed me to grab back a couple of places and then we were on to another first for me (and many others I bet) a dairy farm link track. Nice firm running - as long as you watched where you put your feet!

A short section of road (eeeek) and then onto farmland again and down and around some of the mines. A short piece of single trail on the edge of town was a nice surprise and allowed me to catch the two runners I had been following as far back as about 400 metres at times since they passed me going up the big hill. I was pretty sure one of them was a fellow Vet which was all the motivation I needed to dig a bit deeper (turns out he was). He was struggling a bit with some uphills, so I dug deep and pushed on hard to lose him before he used me for a tow!

Next thing we were up on the track around the top of Martha's Mine and the finish was in sight... it was a relief to see we had the short route while all the other events went right around the mine.

In the end I finished in 2 hours 25 and a bit, which was good enough for 3rd in category on the day and with a body still not 100% from the Ultra, I was pretty happy with this... especially the way I finished strongly again.

Steve and Paulo had done well in their classes as well and had been waiting for about 40 minutes for the 'old buggar', we then had time to head into the lovely village of Waihi for a caffeine infusion at one of the many wee cafes around town before heading back for the prizegiving.

As usual Total Sport did it great... whether I have enjoyed the individual events or not, they know how to make an event that runs smoothly on all the different levels.

This is an event I will happily be back for (dates allowing) next year and of course wll be back in Waihi before that at the end of the year for the Xterra Trail Running Champs. 


Here is the Garmin of the run...