Mantra 116-38K Welirang

Having heard this race for the longest time and really wanted to try it out myself.  Usually Indonesian races will not let you down especially the beautiful mountain scenery.

Race cost is about US109.  There are many categories but the longest one is 116Km, which covers all the peaks in that region of Surabaya.  The race takes place from Kaliandra Eco Resort at Pasuruan in Surabaya.  The nearest airport to the resort is Surabaya, having been to Kaliandra before, I really liked the place and also its rustic remote feel.  The resort actually does a lot of organic farming too producing some fresh vegetables and fruits for the region.

What has changed is that finally there was a highway built to connect the Surabaya Airport to other parts of the region.  Making it much much faster than I visited the last time, which took me about 2-3 hours just for a 70 km.  This time we made it in around 1 hours plus.  But of the course the small roads are still pretty jammed up.

Race Collection

Whole Kaliandra resort is about 42 hectares in area.  It is really huge resort, they have their own organic farm inside also.  This time round, I realise they have a new colonial wing, which was newly build with more affordable and smaller guests rooms compared to the original colonial wing.  As I booked the room rather late, the colonial new wing was all sold out and I had to go for the larger older colonial wing which was really quite large for me.  It has however very good and reliable shower with hot water.  The room was about $230 a night without any breakfast.  The room service food was however rather affordable with one fried rice going at $5 SGD.

Race pack collection was at one of the clearing near to the entrance of the resort.  It was actually quite a nice carnival.  I end up eating there mostly as the food was cheap and rather enough portion for me.  The usual fare was the Soto Ayam which was rice with chicken broth and egg.  I find it pretty delicious, the Ayam Bakar and Ikan Bakar were also very nice too all going for less than S$3.  There were a lot of booths around at the expo, selling Coros watch, running gear, a big Hoka station too.  There were also booths selling the official merchandise for the event.

As usual for Indonesian races, there is a mandatory medical check up which cost $5 mainly checking simple vital stats like the blood pressure and Heart Rate.  There was mandatory gear check and also race briefing which I subsequently missed.  The goodie bag was not bad with a bib, dark blue hoodie, some shampoo samples, muscle rub.  The goodie bag design itself was very nice, I wanted to buy other merch too but did not bring enough cash and also they do not accept credit card which in the end I never bought any.

38K

This time I opted for 38KM because I thought looking at the next category which is 68K, the elevation is 5000m and the cut off is 22 hours.  Based on my experience, I really need more time than that.  As such, I decided to tone down rather than stress myself out.  This year hadn’t been that well for me in terms of health, maybe it is time to recover and take a step back to recover first.  When I reached the resort and saw the mountain, I suddenly thought what I did was the right thing.  This is especially so when my descending was still not that good.

There was only one summit to conquer for the 38K and that is Mt Welirang.  Another category 34km, Mt Arjuno has more participants and the elevation is a little higher compared to Welirang.

Race Proper

This is a sundown race, starting at 12am early morning of Sunday 7th July.  Like the 9 dragon situation, I was not keen to do a race starting at night but the only day categories are 17k and 5k which I thought is really quite short to go all the way to Indonesia to run, somemore there is no summit so meaning no nice scenery.

So although quite sleepy and tired.  I pulled myself up to the start line.  The best part is, it was raining since the evening to 12am.  Already unfolding the pole at the start, I thought the slippery situation will call for the pole at any point as I also had never ran in Mt Welirang before.  The 34k and 38k runners were together at the flag off, although rainy, most of the runners were still very enthusiastic and ready to go.  Headlamps on and every one went off in the rain.

The first part was all uphill, I would say the terrain is not too bad, just a lot of rocks up, as I was travelling up I begin to think about the travel down.  Because for me the up is always much easier than the down. Basically, I could think of these few types of terrain.

1. Rocky big rocks but not the loose rocks type.
2. Soil with water pipes, there was one portion which had a lot of these maybe to transport spring water down to the towns below.
3. Soil tracks with long grass growth.
4. Rocky dirt ash type, this appeared higher altitude towards the summit.
5. My favourite, normal road.

There were 2-3 times of rock river crossing, and some folks slipped and fell there.  I was really slow at those point.  But did fell 2-3 times at the soil tracks with long grass growth especially those which are a bit more steep and slippery.

In total for the 38K there were 4 water points, out of which 1 and 2 were actually the same.  All the water points were well stocked with sufficient hydration ( quite a good selection with water hot and cold, Isomax isotonic drink, coffee and tea, coke) food wise is banana , watermelon, Pop mie, bread ( packet) steamed sweet potato.  The staff were also very rigorous in checking participant bib and also tracking the runners. The check point have basic first aid and medication in case of altitude sickness or sprains and cuts.

The check point up in Welirang was very windy and cold, really amazed at the staff who were up there waiting for the runners because its really quite harsh there and to have tentage is quite impossible there due to the strong wind.  38K runners will need to collect 2 bracelets before returning back to start line to show that they have indeed done the cross without short cut.

At every point, the scenery was breathtaking, while up in the summit, you get to see sulphur spring in action with cloud sea and also dawn breaking.  While going down to the mid way, there are grasslands with lovely trees and vegetations.  The race was a bit crowded in the beginning as all 34-38K started off together and going up the same route.  But soon after the first check point, the runners spread out and it was like just a solo race for me before being overtaken by many at the descent.

Finishing it

After the final check point, runners were going into their home run as all categories will merge back to the Taman safari and road back to the start which is also the finish line in Kaliandra Eco Resort.  The ending was not that sweet for me because I was already having some toe crushing feeling and pain on the right feet, I suspect another black toes which later proved to be correct.  I guess all these were due to the bad descending technique and also jamming of the toes into the shoes on the down hill.  Somemore before the tarmac road start, it was all the rocky road again, there was this Chinese tui na rock treatment feeling as I trampled down.  At this point, many runners were able to overtake me and zoom down.  And finally when into the Taman Safari, it was real granite tarmac ground before entering more rocks to up hill and ending it at the finish line which has quite a good view if on a good day.

Overall, I felt a bit loss of breath and kinda crossed eyed all the way after the descent, went quite a few times to toilet ( very unlike me) and also legs were just too tired to move on.  I do not know if it is due to too much running prior to this race or simply lack of the proper training.   As I scrambled past the finish line, I had a lot to ponder about and also thought about the things that I should have done better.  I guess I was glad to finish the race yet not too glad with my performance.

But that aside, time to enjoy the Surabaya city first before heading back Singapore.  Collected my bakso ayam while a big deal of laundry is awaiting for me to clear !  I really enjoyed the scenery and the race, meeting people old and new and hearing familiar names old and new too.  I do have the wish to tackle the 68 K but maybe not until I get some real techniques sorted out first.