OMM 2011 (8th in B Class)

Both ankles strapped up, energy drinks and Nurofen for breakfast…and that was before we’d even set off on day one. The weather wasn’t helping things either. From the tent it looked grim, from the start line it looked even grimmer.

Two days running in the mountains with all your supplies on your back didn’t feel like a great prospect at the start line but things turned out fairly well for us on the first day. Memorable moments included seeing a poor guy go nipple deep in a freezing river whilst his partner was already 100 meters up the hill and none the wiser, Ian having to run back down a hill to pick up his map, the longest, coldest, hardest 7 km of my life between checkpoints 4 and 5, helping two lost and confused Swedish guys and some guy asking us (as we stood freezing cold, soaking wet in foggy horizontal rain struggling to use our hands) if we where happy with where we were – we knew perfectly well where we were we just weren’t particularly happy about it!

A wet and cold overnight camp was made worse by Ian having a wet sleeping mat and a very wet sleeping bag but our spirits were lifted when we found we were placed 10th overnight which was better than either of us could have hoped for.

Day two went very well for us, Ian’s navigation was spot on (as it was all weekend) and we kept up good running for most of the day, the sun even came out as we descended from the mountains for the last few checkpoints.

Sorry for lack of photos, not much to take photos of for most of the weekend and by the time the sun did come out my camera had given up ( I think it drown)…Ian also reminded me it was a race! This photo from the finish “borrowed” form the official OMM photographers – hence the watermark.

We ended up 7th fastest on the second day which moved us in to 8th place overall. A fantastic result for us which we are both very happy with. I’m also happy not to have anything in the foreseeable future to train for.

–Matt