“I’d lost a heap of weight. I went from 95kg down to the early 70’s due to a change of diet and suddenly thought I was fit.
I started my running journey by competing in the 5km Taranaki ‘Run a Muck Challenge’ which was the first running I had done. After competing in the run, which I had to walk most of, I arrived at the conclusion I was totally unfit! I needed to do something about it. So I made up a 3 to 4 km block from home and started to run/walk between lamp posts until eventually I could run the complete block without stopping. It was less than a month before I could run the entire block.
At this point my neighbour, who’s a keen runner, spotted what I was up to and introduced me to the Taranaki Trail Running group, a great group of people who provided some extra motivation to progress with my running. Then in 2019 after trail running with the crew for a short time, I entered the Taupo Ultra 50km and completed that in a time of roughly 6hrs 24mins, my greatest achievement to date.
Lately I have also been running with the New Plymouth Frontrunner group. They offer some great motivation with their Wednesday night urban trail runs, which I thoroughly enjoy. My goal was to complete my second Ultra Marathon before I am 40 – which I intend on doing at the Taupo Ultra in October. I’m so keen for this event!
The best part of running is meeting new people and making new friends! All the people I have met in the running community are awesome people with some inspiring stories.”
Jase @jasemack_nz
(Taranaki)
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Portraits of Runners + their stories
@RunnersNZ
