Race report by Melissa Dowell
Norseman extreme triathlon had been on my bucket list for 10 years and I finally got the chance to race yesterday.
It involves a cold 3.8km swim in a fjord , a hilly cycle of 180 km over 3 mountains with 3600m of climbing and finishes with a marathon with 1500m of ascent . The first 160 competitors at the 32.5km checkpoint get to climb the mountain Gaustatoppen and earn a black finishers T-shirt whilst the rest of the field descend the road and do laps of a hotel to finish with a white T-shirt. It’s unsupported by the organisers so you take a support crew who follow in the car , providing nutrition and fluids and join you from 25km on the run course .
The day started at 02:45 shovelling breakfast down , racking my bike in T1 and then boarding the ferry at 3:30am . The ferry set off at 4am and sailed up the fjord to enable us to swim back to shore .
At 4:45 we assembled on the deck and then as customary queued to be hosed down with cold water (to prevent cold water shock) and then jumped off the deck . It was exhilarating jumping in the dark . We swam approx 400m to a canoe start line and waited for the starting hooter at 5am .
The swim was beautiful , if a little chilly , apparently around 13 degrees .
I met Mel (one of my support crew in T1 ) who helped me wash my feet and hands in warm water and get ready for the bike course . A rather leisurely T1 meant I left in 28th place . It was wet and windy . I’d put on a shell jacket over my Tri suit , long fingered gloves and toe caps on my shoes , figuring that with the first 40 km predominantly climbing 1200m I’d warm up pretty quickly . We had made the decision the day before that I had enough nutrition and fluid with me not to need support early on as the support cars can stop from 25km into the bike course but the early lay-bys get pretty congested . I had decided to ask for them to be at 52km . This was nearly my downfall , as the higher we climbed , the wetter and colder the weather got . When I finally met them it was apparently -2 degrees and I was bordering hypothermic . I downed a hot coffee and a sandwich , and then they wrestled for approx 10 mins trying to put ski gloves on me ( my hands had turned into claws and my fingers wouldn’t co-operate ) . I put an extra jacket on and a buff and set off.
I spent the next 90 minutes unable to change gear properly or use my tribars as I was shivering too much .. I really thought I was going to DNF and the descending was hairy as I just had to sit up and try to go as slow as possible in the wind and the rain . Thankfully the weather started to dry up and by the last climb the sun came out and I warmed up . I’d have liked to ditch the second jacket by then but had to climb to the top in both where I’d agreed to meet my crew . This last climb is the steepest so by the time I met them I was pretty exhausted . A final descent and I rolled into T2 in 104th place .
I set off onto the run knowing I had to run the first 25km as fast as I could shuffle to get to the bottom of zombie hill . This went to plan with my support crew stopping the car frequently to give me gels ,water ,coke and tip cold stream water over me. I made it to the zombie hill checkpoint in 108th place .
Zombie hill is a 7.5km series of switchbacks with an average ascent of 10% . At this point apart from the elite , most athletes try to power walk up it . I set off , but was rather alarmed when multiple athletes were overtaking me but I couldn’t seem to move any faster . Mel joined me with 5km to go . I started dry heaving so got a bit concerned whether I would make it . Mel fed me dextrose tablets and frequent sips of water and in fact we overtook a few athletes near the top . I was elated to get to the 32.5km checkpoint in 115th place and be told I would be heading up the mountain . It’s then another 5k uphill on the road to where the last 4.7km mountain climb and final checkpoint is sited. With all the ascending I started to get very cold again .
We met Michael , my second support crew at this final checkpoint , who was ready with our mandatory rucksacks . I changed shoes to trail shoes , put a hat , gloves and jacket on and we set off up the rocky path . Some of it was ok but it got increasingly technical as we ascended higher . I was getting colder and colder so ended up with 3 jackets on and in the last 2 km was described as bambi by my crew as my legs weren’t very co-operative . At this point in the race I was not concerned about placing just about making it to the top .
We made it , with a massive hug over the finish line and I’d placed 132nd .
I collected my black finishers T-shirt this morning and haven’t taken it off yet!
That was an epic day and I’m so grateful to my support crew , Mel and Michael who enabled me to both start and finish the race .
What an amazing report by Mel, it sounds tough just reading about it, absolutely amazing stuff, bucket list done and in a brilliant time too, just shows pays to have a great support group round you as well as your own resilience , now time to rest up and occasionally take the Coveted tshirt off for washing 😘😁💪💪
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