The Blue Lake 24 Hour Challenge 2023: Mud and Mayhem.

Kia ora e te whānau. This year, Matt was back at it at the Blue Lake for (what was supposed to be) 24 hours of challenge and excitement in the best worst kept secret on the Aotearoa trail running calendar. Toe’ing the line in the 100km distance, and amongst 700 other hardy souls across multiple levels of challenge from “Casual” to “The Claw” this event has it’s emphasis firmly set on self reliance, and this year the self reliance was put to the test when the stormiest year in the race’s history got a vote in and turned the course into a quagmire and the participants into golems lurching through the technical single track around the lake shore and slip/sliding down the hill on the way home. Unless you’ve been living under a rock you’ll know that the organisers (who take their safety briefing of “don’t die!” seriously) made the difficult decision to call the race after 15 hours. That didn’t diminish the drama or suffering or triumph one bit. Eugene joins Matt as he breaks down the weekend, plus brings us conversations with Gareth Morris, race organisers Chris Townley, Kurt Matthews, and 100km finisher Meg Collins puts her Beast foot forward. Best Enjoyed Running.

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