Mountain running Euro style. Photo: Stephen Day.

Yesterday most of the New Zealand team arrived in Ziano, Italy, where Jonathon Wyatt is based. We’re here for three days of training before we head to the World Mountain Running Championships race village in Casette di Massa. We’ve got a good-sized team of eleven athletes, a team manager and assistant manager and about eight supporters.

Earlier last week we congregated at the World Masters Mountain Running Championships in the Stubai Valley in Austria. Most of the team entered the open/citizens race as a warm-up race while the older ones among us entered the various masters races.

For the men the race started at a small village called Telfes at a height of about 900 metres and climbed firstly through forest trails and then gentler trails above the tree line to about 2100 metres over the space of about 11.5kms. The women started higher up the mountain and raced about 7.5kms.

The team had some great results in the both the open race and the masters championship races. Jono Jackson, Tane Cambridge and Peter Meffan were 1st, 2nd and 3rd in the open men, Tim Robertson and Thomas Anderson were 1st and 2nd in the junior men, Laura Robertson was 1st in the open women, and Sami Jordan was 1st in the junior women. Meanwhile, in the masters’ races, Sally Gibbs was 2nd in W55, Paula Canning was 3rd in W40, I was sixth in M35, and Patrick Meffan was 10th in M55.

The Masters Championships are a huge event, with over 900 athletes from around the world competing (mostly European countries, unsurprisingly). Many of those athletes are very high quality runners. For instance former world mountain running champion Antonio Molinari was there and came third in his M45 race, in a time that I think would have got him second place in the open race.

But at the same time there was incredible camaraderie amount the competitors and celebration in the success and achievements of others. It was the kind of event where I was happy to sing the Australian national anthem for one of the Aussie competitors who won her event.

The New Zealand Trio of Jono Jackson, Tane and Peter, on their way to sweeping the podium in Stubia. Photo” Stephen Day. 

It was great to see most of the rest of the NZ team run so well. And it was pretty cool to see a 79-year-old woman from Croatia win her W75 race. At the prizegiving she was jumping around and springing on and off the podium like a kid. And she had this huge smile and tears, and was waving to everyone from the top of her podium. Somewhat disappointingly she can’t compete next year because the rules don’t allow people 80 years and over to run. Apparently it’s not a good look to have some one dying on the course. However I suspect that would be just the way some of these old codgers would like to go.

But now with that behind us we prepare, try not to over do the training, and wait for the big race, the World Champs, this weekend. That course will start at sea level, which hopefully will make things easier, but will be run in much hotter Italian temperatures and, despite being an uphill only course, contains a couple if significant downhills. It finishes climbing into a gleaming white marble quarry.

Amongst the senior men’s race which I am part of, the tradional European strongholds like Italy will all be present, as will the USA. The Ugandans, who last year took out the top four places, are returning with a full team of six, and Kenya has sent two athletes. It should be a very high quality race.

Personally my goal is to make up for what felt like a below-par race last weekend, and in doing so support the other guys to a strong team result. What that translates to on a course I’ve never seen and against opposition I’ve never met is hard to guess, but hopefully it is creditable. I’ll be nervously excited for the next few days.

Marjolein Cook charging up the first climb. Photo Sharon Wray

What a fun course for the 2013 Athletic New Zealand Mountain Running champs. The sweet technical downhill to finish with, pretty much made you forget the sour climb up the ‘hill(s) of hell’. It was great catching up with Sally & Helen (who I like to see as my ‘team mates’ even though it was due to circumstances I represented the Netherlands at the worlds last year, while NZ would have been my preferred option) and having those 2 legends line up at the start guaranteed some healthy competition. I was worried that my long distance / Motutapu training would have left me behind on this short, intense course, but to my surprise I found myself passing Helen (who’s been running really strongly and is always rather intimidating to line up next to with her fit appearance!) on the uphill about one third up Spoonhill. I managed to keep the lead, except for the ‘flat’ bits on the fire-breaks where Sally came zooming past me with her quick efficient stride. I somehow scrambled my way up the hill of hell just a little bit faster than her and extended the lead coming down Spoonhill which I just absolutely loved. I’ve mountain biked down there multiple times, but have to say running down there is just as fun! It was a bit of an anti-climax not being eligible to win the NZ title, due to an IMO unsuitable rule for a national event. How does me representing the Netherlands at the worlds last year affect competing at the nationals of a country I’ve been living in for over 5 years now (and would like to call home)? All in all, it was a very fun day out and I honestly can’t grasp why the numbers are so slim for such a cool national event?! Fingers crossed I can get my citizenship (application under exceptional circumstances) in time for the worlds in Poland this year – I would love to represent NZ this year, and now I am a married woman I don’t have to worry about losing my Dutch passport (what’s with all these rules?!). Let’s hope I can officially call Helen & Sally my team mates for the 2013 worlds…

Full Results HERE

(BIG)Photo Galleys by Sharon Wray of 9km race HERE, 12km race HERE and Prize Giving HERE

Team NZ lead out the Trofeo Rifugio Scarpa in the Dolomiti mountains, Italy

The New Zealand team arrived in Italy after the long travel to prepare for the World Mountain Running Championships to be held in Ponte di Legno on Sunday 2 September.
As part of their preparation all New Zealand based athletes decided to travel early to Europe in order to acclimatize to the altitude and expected conditions.
Sunday 26 August saw 5 team runners compete in the ‘Trofeo Rifugio Scarpa’ held in the heart of the Dolomiti mountains of northern Italy.

The 5.5km and 650m+ uphill mountain race proved to be a good test for the team and they enjoyed some local competition from runners in the Agordo and Belluno area. All started conservatively because of the recent long travel from the New Zealand. The New Zealand Senior Men’s team finished 2nd and 3rd, Glenn Hughes (33:58) narrowly edging out Dougan Butler (34:12) on the final 400m climb by 14s. The race winner was Jonathan Wyatt (33:02).

Junior Men’s runner Ryan Mcalister had a convincing win back in April at the New Zealand Championships that doubled as the World Mountain selection race and has improved on this form by racing to 7th place in amongst the senior runners.

Sally and Helen relaxing post race

Helen Rountree (41:02) and Sally Gibbs (41:13) shared the lead in the early stages of the women’s race and pulled away easily from the competition. Sally crossed the line first 11seconds before Helen while local runner Cinzia Salvi was 5minutes back. This capped off a successful day for the New Zealand team and a good test before the World Championship race in a weeks time.

The local organizing committee for the race invited the entire NZ team and shared some generous local Italian hospitality including giving the team typical local mountain cheese, meats, wine and grappa and many good memories.

The New Zealand mountain running team for the 28th WMRC is

Senior Women – Helen Rountree, Sally Gibbs and Anna Frost

Senior Men – Dougan Butler and Glenn Hughes

Junior Men- Ryan McAlister

Originally James Coubrough and Marjolein Ros were also named in the team. Marjolein will now represent the Netherlands (where she is from originally) due to citizenship issues, while James pulled out due to injury/fitness.

In the next few days we will be posting a few interviews we have with some of the members of the New Zealand team.

Dougan Butler WMCR interview HERE

Thanks to Jonathan Wyatt for photos and race report