I ran the
Kepler track today: 60kms and 1850 metres of + elevation worth of stunning
mountain trail. It was fantastic.
The Kepler
is one of NZ’z 8 famous “Great Walks” which feature well maintained tracks and
huts at regular intervals, they see many thousands of trampers/ hikers each
year. From what I’ve gathered over the past few months they also make for great
trail runs. In fact the Kepler plays host to New Zealands most famous and
prestigious “mountain running race”, the Kepler Challenge held each year at the
start of December.
I started
out at 8am in the traditional anti-clockwise direction which meant that I would
be done with the major climb after only 17km. The skies were overcast, a
welcome relief after the past few days of high temps. However my legs were
still feeling a little tight this morning after having run 37km (with 1350 metres
of +) up Mt. Luxmore two days ago, so I was careful to stick to a modest pace and
walk any of the steep sections of ascents. The track started with 6km of flat
running through a beautiful forest beside lake Te Anau before climbing steadily
for 1000 metres up to the alpine.
After
around and hour and a half I broke through the cloud cover and had some
brilliant views over a sea of clouds with a few peaks poking through on the
horizon. The section of the run between Luxmore Hut and Iris Burn hut was
easily the highlight of the day. The trail is very runnable, broad singletrack
with only moderate inclines and expansive views. It follows ridgelines for
quite a few kilometres which made for a very dramatic atmosphere, especially
with the sea of clouds in the valleys below.
I made a
brief stop at each of the huts to refill water bottles and met a few dozen
folks (mostly Germans it seemed) who were hiking the trail in the usual 3-4
days. Everyone was stoked on the awesome views and super encouraging to me,
which was nice and much appreciated.
As was
pre-arranged, I met my brother Thor on the trail about 10km from the end and we
ran the last bit together. By this stage I was starting to flag a bit so it was
good to have someone there to hold a steady pace for me to follow even if he
did confuse me by giving random estimations of how long we had left (“only 3k
left” when we were within 1km of the finish).
The run
went really well, my pace was steady, the views were immense and I only fell
over once so I’m calling it a win.
Time- 6:53
Menu- 9x Clif Shots gels
4 litres of some generic
electrolyte drink powder I get from supermarkets here in NZ
