Ijen Trail Running 2017- Trail running in Indonesia

Trail Running in Indonesia

There are many places in the Asia Trail Masters recommendation in Southeast Asia.  Personally, I have only done trail in Thailand and Indonesia, despite Malaysia being the nearest county to Singapore, I have never tried the mountains in Malaysia.

In fact my first trail race 42km was in Bromo, Indonesia also.  Little did I know that further towards the East of Surabaya there was Ijen, a group of composite volcanoes located in the Banyuwangi Regency of East Java, Indonesia.  Same like Mt Bromo, they are situated at higher altitude with breath taking scenery.

The Ijen Trail is my third activity on the hills this year.  But to speak the real truth, the trails in Indonesia are much more structured and has less vegetation than the ones I had in Thailand, which had a lot of insects too.  It is always relaxing to run in Indonesia, to my surprise, and the weather is not as bad as I thought it will be despite the sunny sun shine in the afternoon.  Ijen and Bromo have the same type of temperature, in the day, it is cooling and just nice with some sunshine.  While when it is dark, the temperature really drop and it is really cold, I personally felt that it was about 17-18 degrees at night.

Ijen Bondowoso

Views from Kawah Ijen and the sulphur miners

Ijen itself has already attracted many tourists over the years.   This is especially so with the National Geographic channel did a feature on the Blue fire of the Ijen crater.

The Blue fire is caused by ignited sulphuric gas, which emerges from cracks at temperatures up to 600 degrees Celsius .  The sight is only visible at night as in the day, the sunlight cause the blue flames to be invisible. The flames can go up to 5 metres.  However, I was not able to catch a glimpse of this wonderful sight because we left the homestay at about 3 am which is already too late.

When you reach the Kawah Ijen visitor centre, you still need to walk about 3km to the crater area and it is all uphill elevation.  From there , visitors will need to make their way down to the crater to catch the sight.  It will take about another 45 minutes.  The entrance ticket for local and foreigners are not the same so you have to indicate which ticket you would like to purchase at the ticketing area.  When you are up in the crater, the smoke can get really thick.  One thing about the smoke is that it comes with a spike feeling maybe due to the sulphuric content.

At the mid point, there is a half way point where there are sellers selling drinks and small snacks.  Some of the people are also around renting out masks, but personally I feel that the masks might not be that clean as they are recycled.  Try to bring along your own N95 or simple surgical mask.

If you are going to visit the Blue Fire, do make sure you reach the entrance and make your way up the crater around 1 am.  Here are some of the essential things which you might want to bring along:

• Headlights
• Gloves ( in case you are climbing down the crater and need to grab something)
• Sweater or Windbreaker ( night temperature can go as low as 9 deg celsius)
• Mask ( N95 or just the surgical mask, depending on you , if you are really those very susceptible to smoke then you need a N95 at least)
• Drinking water( along the way there is no sales of food or water)
• Poncho ( this is really optional but up in the altitude sometimes there might be drizzles)

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});

Ijen Trail Running Race

So after a night of sight seeing, we got back to what we came for, the IJEN TRAIL RUNNING.  This is the third year that this race has been going on.  There are more and more participants each year due to the good reviews.

The race has a new category of 100km this year, only the 70km and 100km get to run through the Ijen crater area and get the view of the blue water in the crater in the day.  For the 42km and 21km, the runners will get the view of Mount Ijen from far.

42Km distance

Signed up for the 42km , although I wanted to go for the 70km, but I thought such a long ride to the race point will be really tired if your legs are also tortured( in the end, I realise there was not difference, the leg is still stretched and tired from all the climbing.  The cut off time for the 42 km is about 10 hours.  Flagging off at 5am, most of the race is taken at daylight.  We were lucky that there was no rain, it was a sunny day, usually around five plus, the sky is already bright.  It starts to get really hot from 9 am onward, but the good thing is that air is not that humid, so you will not be sweating non stop, most of the time, the vegetation in the forest also helps to shield the sun away from you.

The villages in this region, to my surprise, is more structured and organised than Bromo side.  They all have standardised architecture with a garden in front of their houses.  Very well arranged and the roads are also cleaner than the Tosari area in Bromo.  The race organisers provide arrangement for accommodation and transportation.

However, to speak the truth, it was not really that well organised, 2 of my friends from Singapore, did not get their accommodation and we had to hustle the Catimore Homestay to give them a place.  While for my case, my transportation back to Surabaya did not show up despite numerous attempts to contact and call.

Accommodation

There are not many places to stay in the area:

Catimore Homestay( 5 km away)

The chalet or bed and breakfast is about 5km from the race point.  There are 2 wings to this place.  The older one is actually a bungalow with many rooms and large living room area.  The newer wing, which is nearer to the reception, are cleaner with tile floor and better bath room.  To speak the truth, the standard of the room is really not good, the rooms in the old wing had some mouldy smell.  The bedding didn’t seem like that it had been cleaned before.  There were no towels and also toiletries.  You will nee to bring your own.  Although I did not mind the quality but the price is really not that worth it  about 300,000 Rp for a weekend night.  The only comforting thing about this homestay is that there were still some hot water for shower, and its swimming pool is really clean for a dip after the race.

Arabica Homestay( 800m away)

This is the nearest commercial residential for the runners.  The place seemed cosy and there was a nice dining area.  However, I heard from the folks living there that there was no hot water supply.  This can be rather devastating as it is really cold and I believe all runners after the race would like to have a good hot shower.

Local Homestays (all within 5 km )

There are actually many local residential around, from some of the Indonesian runners, I got to know that they actually can reserve a house to stay in too.  But since I know no contacts, and I do not speak Bahasa Indonesia, so I did not bother to inquire more and just followed the race ograniser plans.  After coming back, I realise that there were some listings on Booking.com and also tripadvisor had some recommendations too.  So do check out also.

Race Pack Collection

The race is about 200km away from Surabaya, there were transportation from Surabaya and Bali.  All takes about 6-8 hours depending on the traffic.  We also had one dinner break in between from Surabaya to Sempol, the race point.  Arriving about 10pm in the evening to the town office, it was already dark when we collected our race bibs.  The race pack was a small red drawstring bag with bib, tee shirt and some brochures inside.

There were no expo whatsoever like the big and more subscribed races. It is just a simple local town office within the park.

Start off and Finish Point

The race starts and finishes at the same place.  It is actually a field with a very small sheltered Spectator gallery.  There is a bag drop , massage area and also toilets all within the same location.  The parking area is also nearby for the shuttle buses and also private vehicles to park.  Some vendors actually set up a small store for sale of food and drinks.

The centre stage is where announcement and performance were given.

The Course

some of the scenery

The course is a mixture of mud trail, rocky road, tarmac road and grass land.  It is actually not very technical and pretty comfortable to run in,the vegetation is not that dense.  Ground is not as slippery and there was no river crossing.  Near the Warung Ijen, it felt like running on the Mongolian grassland, wide, spacious windy.  Really enjoyed myself for this trail.  At the same time, there were many scenic spots for photo session.  It was so much so that I forgot that this is a race!  We passed by villages and also farmer houses and plantations.

Besides the flora, animals like Cow, chicken, wild monkey and lizards were also spotted.  There were not that many insects, which I thought will have.

There were about 4 waterpoints all in all.  The points were not really as indicated on the map in the website.  But all the stations were will equipped with medical staff and some even had ambulance.  Bananas, plain, water were the mandatory items at the stations.  But some of them had specials, like eggs, potatoes, steamed tapioca.  Since it was the fasting period for the Muslims, they also had dried dates available.  Not like the conventional road races, there were no gels, isotonic drinks or “artificial” items there.

There were a total of 128 finishers in the 42 km race this year, most of the time, the course was not filled and jammed and there were times where I was running solo, enjoying the scenery all by myself.

Friendship and Finishing

Finisher entitlements( medal, tee shirt with food at the gallery for finishers to rest)

To speak the truth, there were some points especially towards the end where there was a uphill, I was really really tired, but no point you feel like giving this up though.  Along the way I met many Indonesians from Surabaya or other parts of Indonesia making their way down specially to the race.  Actually if you take public transport, it could take up to days.  But they were so enthusiastic, especially the various running groups, wearing all the same tee shirt! I was impressed.

Two groups I met this time, the We Run ( Surabaya) group and also a Cycling turned running group, these folks were camwhoring throughout the race and event taking videos ( with retakes) and they can even come in like six hour plus.  I am truly amazed, and some of them are just starters, who probably did only one or two road marathons before this!  Special thanks to the following people:

Singaporean group: Denise, Terrence , Rizal and Ajuna. for being in the same bus!

Indonesian runners:

Alex and Fang: They were on the same bus with us to the start point.  But we never had a chance to talk more than just at the starting line.

Henry Wong: Without you I think I will be stuck in the mountains.  Thank you again for bringing me back to Surabaya with and entourage of 14 hot hunks! Also not forgetting the yummay wanton noodles,fried rice and hot orange juice.  Lastly, the oleh oleh! It made my office colleagues really happy! We will meet again ! WE RUN

Denny Suhartono: This lanky dude, was happily videoing all the time and also taking pictures for the group he was with.  Not only one take, but many takes! But thanks to him I got a real nice vid or myself running and got to see some of my running flaws.  Claiming that this was his second trail only, I am impressed the power and spirit that these runners have.

Ronald: The guy who had very serious cramps but …could still go downhill fast.  A teacher and cyclist turned runner, I was happy to have him company the last stretch uphill.

Indah and Helen: Saving the beauties to the last.  Like I said before, Indonesian ladies are beautiful and powerful.  Helen was running on air, and Indah was way way before me until the cramp came in.  She probably will be the top 3!

Finishing this race in the hot afternoon sun, but really happy to receive the medal and finisher tee.  Walking to the spectator gallery with a very painful gluts, I think I will need a long long time to recover from this.  But I am glad I came and met so many people 🙂 Will come back again for the 70km !

Official Website: http://www.ijentrailrunning.com/