Mousdash – Mount Coot-tha, Brisbane

Results

Before Westies in Scotland had even gone to sleep on Saturday us Aussie Westies had done our Sunday morning run – the Mousdash, a 10.5km race round Mount Coot-tha, which at only 287m, is the highest point in a range of hills on the outskirts of Brisbane.
At 6:30am (early ..but any later and we’d be cooked in the sun) DavidR and I joined another 700 or so runners on the start line, some donning comedy moustaches for ‘MOvember’: we were already warm in the early morning sun. The 2.5km uphill start did nothing to cool us down and by the top of the climb it was lovely to reach a well-placed drinks station and thrown a few cups of chilled water over our hot heads. The next 6km were great fun: ups and downs on the road snaking round the back of the hill with lovely views, the sun shining through the trees, coasting down the downs passing folks who had the brakes on and then trying to keep on going through the ups. Then, at 8.5km or so, the road headed downhill … steeply and for ages and ages. Initially my quads were holding up ok as I tried to relax, lean forward etc etc. But after 1.5km they started quivering with every step. The sight of a man with a huge fake moustache running past in starry Y-fronts distracted me for a while, but as he disappeared down the hill (and I wondered if I’d been hallucinating) the legs grabbed full attention again. Nothing for it but to keep going – so with one final downhill and then an uphill finish it was done. Relaxing afterwards in the sun with some chilled water and watermelon was bliss. All in all – Awesome, as they say here!
Results were:
1st Man 38:03
1st Lady 42:19
14th (13th Man) DavidR 43:07
102nd (10th Lady) Cat 50:26