Had a superb weekend at Ohinewairua Station, near Taihape, running in the 21k “Human versus Horse” race.
Was soundly beaten into second place behind a very fit horse and rider.
It felt great to be running out in a true NZ heartland hill country station and in a region where my dad’s side of the family hails from. Mae, Maree and Mia stayed at my Uncle Geoff’s farm nearby the night before and he joined us in the morning for the race too to see what the fuss was all about.
In fact there was not much fuss - they keep things simple out here - but there was a lot of adventure and fun. And a few hiccups in the morning…
Highlights:
Missed the runners start by 5 minutes, sheltering too long in the warmth of the woolshed. It was freezing outside and I stayed in there to do my warm up and stretches. Until Uncle Geoff came running in to yell at me: “Nicko! What are you doin!? They’ve been calling for you at there and they’ve already started!! Get a move on boy!”
I sprinted out through the yards to start chasing. Eventually caught up with the back of the (human) field, then the mid-pack and took the front of the humans at about the 10k mark. Not without some effort. The horses had a staggered start but were now gaining on us humans.
jumped a couple of dead sheep
veered well clear of some very large cattle who looked a bit too interested for my liking
tripped over a turnip in a crop field. Or was that a swede? Packed it up for emergency race nutrition.
I built a 5-10 min lead on the humans but was caught by the lead horse at 16k
Running with the horses was incredible. There was some brief to & fro on the downhill for approx 1 kilometre were I got a nose in front, on the technical stuff - and then I was absolutely left for dust (mud actually) with 4k to go. Smoked by a horse.
Post race prize ceremony was a true highlight of the whole weekend. It included a warm fire, spit roast and story of the station given by manager Mark.
Overall an outstanding event - many thanks to Lizzie and all of the Human vs Horse team. Looking forward to returning!