No! No! November...

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

Oh my God. What a weekend! Here's my report:

I spent this weekend land-crewing for a team of 4 kayakers in the Hawkesbury Canoe Classic: an annual 111km overnight race on the Hawkesbury River just north of Sydney. I was kind of privileged really - between the four of them (racing a K4 kayak) they had completed 51 of these races and so were very experienced, very professional and very demanding of their land crew. If you can imagine: meeting at pre-arranged checkpoints along the river (in pitch dark); cleaning out the boat, feeding them, topping up drinks; massaging, changing clothes, making running repairs to the boat and equipment; motivating them; administering first aid and pseudo-coaching advice, all in the space of 5-10 minutes and re-launching them back into the inky darkness ... exhilirating and often scarey stuff.

The demands are intense - many of these check points are a long walk from the nearest road access (in the dark) and you have to carry everything they might need: not just the food and drinks they have requested for each stop, but every possible variation thereof and perhaps things they hadn't even thought of beforehand, not to mention clothing, heat and light, first aid, mechanical equipment, navigation equipment and so on ad infinitum.

Just finding them in the dark and guiding them into the landing point was bad enough, but then giving them everything they need in a F1-style pit stop keeps the adrenaline flowing I can assure you. And we're talking not about clean, clinical tyre-changes here - we're talking about cleaning out not just water from the boat but the bodily fluids as well (in extreme environments, the body lets go from both ends) and dealing with things one had no experience of before (eg fixing recalcitrant seats and steering gear with gaffa tape and cable ties in the dark whilst standing knee-deep in water) and learning the fine art of non-political correctness ("yes your paddler is comatose; no they haven't kept anything down for the last 5 hours; no you can't take her to first aid or they'll force us to withdraw - just give her 5 minutes on the ground then get her back in the boat") ... I'm sure you get the drift. Not people to be trifled with.

If you can imagine this: it's nearly midnight. My boat has been on the water 6 hours, the crew have just had a break and are ready to go again. All except for my paddler, who has just passed out on the ground in front of me and is now more or less comatose. A normal person in a normal situation would call an ambulance. Not here. The routine is pick them up, get them to the boat by whatever means and back in their seat with their paddle in their hands. At some point they will come to and realise that they have to continue or the team must withdraw. And that's what they do. They get on with it. Physical and mental exhaustion are no excuse. Come what may, they just d-o-n-'t quit.

Now these people aren't reckless. This seemingly abusive situation isn't thrust on anyone who hasn't handled it before and isn't known to be anything other than ruthlessly stubborn and determined beyond belief. Mere unconsciousness is no more a reason to quit than a slight sniffle is reason to take early retirement from the workforce. Quite frankly, whilst on the surface it may seem insanely dangerous, I admire them. In fact I admire them immensely. It's not like there's much at stake here. There's no gingo-istic, fervent patriotism on display or chest-beating: this is just a bunch of keen otherwise-normal-looking-people who happen to be kayakers paddling a river in the dark on an anonymous night in November because it's a neat thing to do.

As one of them said to me, "It's incredibly selfish really, but it beats the hell out of staying at home and watching a DVD".

And that's what got to me: if you're going to do a selfish thing, you may as well do something that you will remember.

And so, as my paddler moaned to me "Why on Earth do I do this year after year" as she lay there in the mud at checkpoint "D" in considerable pain and unable to eat, drink or even move, yet so fiercely determined to finish the damn thing, I could only think how heroically stupid this all was. But then, it's the hero part that makes it worthwhile, makes life so alive, whilst nothing but mediocrity awaits those who sit on the couch and simply watch life go by...

Hand me my running shoes please, I'm off for a run.



*Not unlike the RC community, but rather closer to home, and in the flesh**, so to speak.

**Actually, there was a bit of that as well. Ever noticed how extreme athletes have no shame? Modesty is not a commodity they understand, even though they may be/often are humble people?