I’ve always wanted to run the Walhalla Wound-Up, but this year was the first in 3 years that I’ve either been in the country, or not doing another race. I only considered doing the 50km about two weeks ago, when I decided to skip the Bunley Half and save my legs. While recently I was in France and Switzerland training and racing with the national orienteering team, I haven’t done a run longer than 30km all year so I was a bit scared of the distance.
The weather outlook wasn’t particularly friendly and at 8am when the 50km run started it was raining steadily and I decided to keep the Salomon gore-tex on. Good thing too as while the rain was intermittent, I never got hot enough to take it off for the whole race. Right from the gun, the eventual winner David Staehr took off to the lead and was out of sight in no time. I was hoping that he didn’t know what was coming up and was over ambitious, but turns out he is just a really quality runner.
The first 9.5km down to The Old Steel bridge is in my opinion the nicest part of the course. The old tram line is a delight to run on as it weaves slightly downhill from 400m elevation to 250m. There were plenty of erosion slips and fallen trees to contend with, but that just adds to the challenge. I passed through 10km in 47.24mins which I was happy with and started getting a bit more competitive. My original goal was just to be 4hrs28mins, which was the time my mate Josh Street did last year. I decided to see how I was going after 20km before I pushed any harder though. The section to Coopers Creek (17km) is really nice, though the trail opens out now and gets hillier. The climb out of Coopers Creek was a real killer- 300m climb in 4km, and I was glad to cross over the main road into the more undulating section. However this was the wettest and slipperiest part of the course with many big puddles to traverse.
The 9km section along the Cowwarr road are quite flat and relatively fast. I ran through half way in 2hrs04mins20secs and was feeling pretty good still. The turn-off to Brunton’s Bridge came quicker than expected and it was good to have a quick chat with Margaret and get stuck into some coke and lollies. She informed me that the leader had 10-15mins on me, so I figured it was going well and I didn’t need to expect him coming back to me anytime soon. The descent down to Brunton’s Bridge is one of my favourite tracks on earth, though normally I’m flying down it on the mountain bike. The path is the original coach road to the Walhalla gold fields and is cut into steep hillsides with deadly drops off the side. The whole area was burned in the 2006/07 fires and the forests are still recovering. The bridge was recently restored after the fires, so runners don’t have to run through the Thomson River any more.
I was expecting the final stage over Happy Go Lucky to be very hard, and it didn’t disappoint. Not many courses can claim to throw in an 8km/400m climb after 37km. I was starting to suffer at 42km drink stop and the km rates were slowing and I thought that running 5min/km average (4hrs10mins) was unlikely now. Finally the summit came and so did the final drink stop with 5km to go. I figured it was mostly downhill from here so gave it everything as the legs had just a little more to give. The final few kilometres are great fun, perfectly declined and twisty, and you don’t get to see Walhalla until you’re literally on top of it. I was really happy to finish 2nd in 4hrs08mins59secs, about 20mins ahead of my goal and just sneaking under 5min/kms. David Staehr ran a new course record of 3hrs54mins24secs which is a great time considering the wet and cold conditions.
And congrats to Kathryn who claimed the win the 21.1km race.
Thanks to Bruce Salisbury and all the other Traralgon Harriers who helped organise the race. And also to Michael Leaney of the Star Hotel for sponsoring the event. It is certainly a fantastic course and I’d recommend everyone head there next year before the old tram lines get washed away forever!
Thanks to Salomon for the fantastic Speed Cross 3 shoes. I hadn’t run further than 10km in these shoes prior to the race and couldn’t believe how good they were over 50km of wet and rugged terrain.
Thanks to Shotz Sports Nutrition for the best sports gels around. I tried the new Mango/Passion flavour- fantastic!
3 Blackheart team members are in the car heading to the Upper Murray Challenge, one of Australia’s premier multisport race. The race consists of a tough and hilly 38km mountain bike, 26km downriver paddle on the Murray River, and finishes with a 25km run. 
