It’s been over 3 hours since I began my ascent to the Finish at Pekan Nabalu. Night has fallen and I can barely make out the trail ahead. I’ve cuts and bruises and I’m muddied from top to toe.
I’ve spent the last few minutes trying to tear open a pack of GU Chomps. My fingers are slathered in mud and I eventually prise it open with my teeth. Still, I get mud over every damn chomp so it’s blueberry flavoured MUD for dinner.
There are runners resting on the ground. Runners in their emergency blankets. Runners clawing the earth on all fours – scrambling and grasping for root, rock, trunk, stump or branch – anything that will give them a handhold or a foothold to pull or push themselves up.
Most have slipped or tripped and fallen at some point. The heavy rains in the evening and the earlier passage of the 30K participants and 50K frontrunners has caused significant erosion to the course. Progress is painful, slow and dangerous – I have never had to endure a physical challenge of this nature and the creeping fear in the back of my mind is that I will not make it home safely.
I’ve called Angela several times in the last hour. Or at least I think I have – why live in muddy hell when you can live in your head, right?
“Hi Sayang!”
“Hi sayang …”
“Where you!”
“Stuck.”
“Stuck where?!”
“Mud.”
“Why stuck?”
“Cos mud.”
“Poor sayang!”
“Ya.”
Our conversation isn’t going anywhere and neither am I; indeed, I’m struggling on a slope and stuck, as it were. I get a helping hand from a guy in front. Thanks buddy.
I figure I’d just call her after I’ve well and truly expired.
“Hello?”
“AWOO?”
“Sayang?”
“A WOO WOO WOO!”
“Oh I geddit. You’re dead.”
“WOO!”
“Well I didn’t bring your Amulet of Ghost-Speak you @#$%.”
“WOO?”
“Now I’ll have to raise Ava all by myself.”
“OO.”
“Well at least I know your passwords.”
“OO @#$%.”
“I’m gonna give ALL your Gold to your Warcraft guildmates!”
“@#$% WOO!”
“I’m gonna sell ALL your collectible cards!”
“@#$%! @#$%%%%%%%%%%%%!”
“Oh and we’ll bury you in your RACEPANTS.”
“…”
Some things aren’t worth dying for, I guess. I figure I’ll call her – for reals – after I’m done. So it’s one step at a time and one foot in front of the other. Kind of like the last 14 @#$%^&* hours. But slower.
The marshals/mountain guides I come across give me straight and honest answers. None of that “5 more minutes” or “just a little bit more” bullshit.
“1KM.”
“300-400 meters.”
After an eternity plus 5 or so minutes, I reach the Finish and get my tag scanned in for the last time.
“So I’m good?”
“You’re good!”
“I made the cut-off?”
“You did, congratulations!”
“So … I’m good?”
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