My last four races have all been in different countries. I ran the Melbourne half marathon in October, the Angkor Wat half in Cambodia in December, half a half marathon in New York City on 25 April, and the Rotorua marathon in New Zealand on 1 May.
I don’t train in order to race; I enter races so that I’ll do the training.
I’m the sort of person who needs to set goals. Without them, I’m all over the shop. Setting racing goals gets me out there for early morning runs with my pals, and it’s those runs that I find necessary for my physical, mental and emotional health. If I’m not running, I’m not my best self.
I find running is also a fantastic way to meet people when I’m travelling. When I visit a new place, I will often seek out a local running club or the Hash House Harriers for running company.
I’ve even been chatted up while on the run. In Cambodia, I met a Canadian bloke when I was running along Phnom Penh’s Sap River. We ended up making a date for a run together the next morning, which turned into dinner that night.
The following morning I flew up to Siem Reap for the half marathon, which skirts the edges of the 12th-century ruins of Angkor Wat. The course was lined in places with hordes of young children, whose outstretched hands we touched as we ran past. It’s the only race I’ve participated in where the spectators have included monkeys.
I spent time at the start and during the race talking with a Swedish tour guide from Ho Chi Minh City, a Scottish woman who works with a law firm in Dubai, an American who is with the World Bank in Bangkok (she and I ran about half the race together until I started to fade at around 16K), and a Danish woman who was setting up a factory in Hanoi.
On Pub Street that night, I sat with my feet in a tank of fish and had a fish massage while chatting with a woman who works in Hong Kong with the art auction house Christie’s.
The Phnom Penh Hash House Harriers (P2H3) meet on Sunday afternoons for runs in various locations (www.p2h3.com). There is also an Angkor Wat Hash (www.hannostamm.com/hash.htm).
A couple of weeks ago I flew to New York to run the More half marathon with my friend Kathy and her friend Jodi. Kathy and I are friends through an online running network. Last year, when I was passing through San Francisco, she and her family took me to dinner at the fabulous Cliff House.
On the day of the race it was raining and freezing cold. I had no goals for this event, which I had always intended to run just for fun. By the end of Jodi’s and my first circuit of Central Park, I was chilled to the bone and decided to bail. I had too much on my plate over the next month, to risk getting sick. Jodi and Kathy persevered despite the grim conditions and finished.
Six days later I was lining up at the start of the Rotorua marathon, in New Zealand. It was only my second attempt to run 42.2 kilometres. I’ll be doing it twice more this year: in Portland, Oregon, in October and in New York in November.
I spotted a bloke wearing a Portland marathon T-shirt, so I introduced myself. Mark was on holiday in New Zealand from the US, and was competing in races wherever he found them during his travels. Three days later, he popped up two rows ahead of us on our flight from Auckland to Sydney. And today my American friend Nangel, who I will meet for the first time later this year in Portland, told me she ran a long training run there yesterday and got chatting with a bloke named Mark who had just returned from running a marathon in Rotorua, New Zealand… When she said a friend of hers from Australia had also run it, he put two and two together. It’s certainly a small world when you’re a runner!
My friends Di and Rose from Albury were also at the starting line in Rotorua.
Four and a half hours later, I staggered across the finish line, happy to have beaten my Honolulu marathon time by 5 minutes.
The next day, Di and I ironed out the kinks by taking an hour’s walk with my dad and a friend through Rotorua’s stunning redwood forest (www.redwoods.co.nz). A good long soak in the hot mineral baths at the Polynesian Spa (www.polynesianspa.co.nz) also helped soothe our aches.
Visitors to Rotorua can join in runs hosted by Lake City Athletic Club (www.lakecity.co.nz).
DON’T MISS: In Cambodia: Fish massage; green papaya salad; pre-dawn exercisers on Sisowath Quay; Genocide Museum and the Killing Fields. In Rotorua: Hokey pokey ice cream; a forest walk; lunch at Fat Dog Café.
A few days after this column appears I’ll be setting out on my adventure. First stop: Ubud, in Bali for a week; then Kuching, in Sarawak, for a month. A big ‘thank you and mwa’ to Julie, Dinky Di, Frangipani, Rosie, Christine, Miss Vicki, Roberta, the Vixens, and my trainer Jules for sharing your runs and bad jokes with me.
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