Paparoa

Activity Date: 19 Dec 2021
Updated: 11 Nov 2024
People: Finn, Tim Hargraves

Runners: Finn and Tim

A friend from work is moving to Australia for a year and has entered an ultramarathon (!) there. To enter the race he needed to prove that he could run 50km+ at a pace greater than 11:30/km with elevation > 1500m (I think). The Paparoa ticked all the boxes and I managed to back myself enough to give it a shot!

We headed off from Christchurch rather early in the morning with the aim to run West to East. This is the more difficult direction because the West (coast) is lower in elevation than the East so we had more hill climbing to do. The track starts off really nicely and we hit a quite reasonable 5min pace. It soon starts climbing, however, and we really dialed it back.

The first hut we reached was Pororari - it took us 1:55. From there the track climbs even more steeply so we ended up simply power hiking most of the uphills and running the flats and the downs. This is quite an effective technique! The traverse along the tops to is beautiful and we reached Moonlight Tops Hut at 4:40.

The track carries on undulating its way to Ces Clark Hut, although I think this section is technically downhill. It was in this section that I hit my longest run ever - and I was feeling okay! Some butt chafe arrived and my legs were tired but we kept plodding along, ticking off the kms.

The descent from Ces Clark Hut seems like it would be a killer but I found it amazing on the legs. It’s gentle enough that you won’t smash your quads, but not so gentle that it doesn’t assist in keeping the kms ticking over.

I didn’t eat all the food I expected I would - I’m always trying to eat more on every run because I know it’s a nutrition game! In the end we finished in almost 8:30hrs with a 9min pace! Totally smashed Tim’s qualifying time out of the park. Best luck, mate!

I loved having run a Great Walk and find myself inspired to run more (all) Great Walks in the coming year or two!