100K walk?  I will, if you will.  

This past weekend 118 teams, each with four members, attempted to complete a 100K-trail walk in 48 hours or less. Oxfam Canada has put on the event for two years now, striving to raise $500,000 in support of “long-term development”, advocacy and emergency programs in 28 countries around the world.  Oxfam Canada works with people to secure their basic human rights and campaigns against the root causes of poverty and injustice. I was fortunate to be a part of one of the trail walk teams.

It was an honour to take part in the event.  Our team, “Pink Dynamite” consisted of four people; Mindi, Ashley, Mike and myself.  The race began at 9:00am sharp on Friday July 23.  With grey skies and an expected high of thirty degrees with humidity, the horn blew and 118 determined teams crossed the start line. 

Though the mass of people began as one, as we progressed teams started dispersing, each finding their own comfortable pace.  There were a variety of styles, from careful stepping to light jogging, but our strategy was to take it slow.  We didn’t want to wear ourselves out before the end of the race.  After all, a 100K walk is no laughing matter – it’s hard work!

The beauty of the trail definitely made things easier.  The mud, mosquitoes, hills, and streams were rarely formidable obstacles, because the picturesque trail was well worth the hardships. 

The trail was broken up into nine sections with checkpoints at the end of each section.  I can say with complete certainty that we wouldn’t have made it to even the first check point without knowing that our magnificent support crew (Kristen) would be waiting there for us with food and fresh socks. As we strolled up to checkpoint one, there was Kristen in the distance, waving eagerly and grinning.  She quickly ran to her car and brought out a blanket for us to rest on and provided us with water, Gatorade and munchies. 

The walk was an amazing experience.  I learned a lot about myself along the way, realizing that to get through tough times the support of others lends relief to the tension of a situation.  Part of the challenge was to complete the event as a group of four, encouraging each other along the way.  At some points, one person would be feeling down or sluggish and it was the responsibility of the other teammates to lend a: “You can do it, we’re almost at the next checkpoint!” or a “There will be food and massages in just 2K, that’s what we’re walking towards – We’ve got this guys!”

Walking 100K is not only physically challenging, but it’s also mentally challenging.  There were certainly times when I felt like I wanted someone to ax my feet off because they were so sore. Getting past the physical strains of the event took a strong mental ability to do so, and as teams started to give up it became clear this was no walk in the park.   

I’ve completed several half-marathons and 10K runs, but this was a unique experience.  When running in a typical race, you are running for yourself and creating personal bests based on your own abilities.  In the Oxfam trail walk, it was a group experience and we went through everything together as a team.  We had to start together, stick together and finish together and that’s something I wasn’t used to doing.  I learnt that I relied on other people for support, and I wouldn’t have been able to do it without having people rooting for me along the way.

Tags: 100k Trail Walk, oxfam canada, susan frye

This entry was posted on Monday, July 26th, 2010 at 7:25 pm and is filed under Lolë World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.