My latest crazy adventure

When you send these kinds of texts to your friends the night before a new adventure, you know you're in for an interesting morning.  Or that you're a bit loopy.  Or both - they're the

Oh, it's just your usual Saturday morning, getting chook feed strapped to my stomach ;)

same thing really:

"OMG what are we doing?"

"Do you have some spare chook feed for me?"

"Yes!  I got some strong masking tape from Fiona!"

HA!  See what I mean?  Yes, my life is always a little wacky.

So we all know that almost weekly, I come

Em starting her walk interstate!

up with these crazy ideas.  And I don't plan anything or think it through very well.  'It'll just work out' - I tell myself.  Then the night before I kind of start wondering what I've gotten myself into.  Especially like when I was discussing chook feed in detail at 11pm last night.

So - this week's personal challenge was to do the Kokoda loop at Mt Coot-tha - the usual 5km loop with the crazy 1km steep incline that we always do, but with 40kg of weights strapped to

I felt like I was wearing a fat suit!

me!  The idea was modelled off The Biggest Loser - how they have to walk up a mountain carrying the weight that they have lost.  It's to remind them of how far they've come, and I guess to let the weight go....physically and metaphorically.  I wanted to do that!  And I have friends who are as crazy as me and also wanted to do that!

One of these friends who I met through 12WBT, Emily, wanted to do it but she lives in NSW.  Which is an awesome place to live!  But a little far away when I live in QLD.  757km in fact.  But, what's 757km between friends?  Em had the brilliant idea of doing it together, just not actually together.  We decided to do our own walk, up our own local mountain, at the same time, and call/SMS/message photos etc. through to keep each other company!  My equally as crazy friends, Courtney, Bron and Tracey, also were keen.  Court and Bron are the more sane ones of the group - they decided to write letters to themselves to let go of at the top of the mountain instead of tying themselves down with weights.

However, Tracey, Em and I, well we're the nutty ones.  Em and I have each lost 40kg and Tracey's lost a huge 50kg!  And we were each determined to carry that weight on us, up the hill!

And that's where the chatter about chook feed came in.  Tracey went and bought and bagged sand and chook feed late last night.  Whereas I personally didn't think things through and

Weighed down....and out!

decided to use hand weights.....

Last night I tried on a backpack with 27kg in it and toppled backwards.  Hmmm.  After some very smart advice from friends and trainers about how to do this, we remembered that when we were 40 and 50kg heavier, yes we carried it with us, but it was distributed all over.  And we were also reminded that our backs aren't meant to carry 40kg alone.  So I rethought it all.

We all met early this morning and got to work with our support crew, Bill and Bob, getting the weight distributed.  While Emily patiently waited in NSW, Tracey strapped her left over sand and chook feed to my stomach!  I then distributed some sand but mostly hand weights - in a back backpack, a front backpack, down my top, in the pockets of the shorts Tracey lent me, and in my jacket pockets.  Tracey also wore ankle weights!  It was crazy!

And then we started out.  

It.....was.....so.....hard.

We usually do Kokoda in about an hour.  I've run it before....  Once I did it 4x in a row.  I've done it in a moon boot.  I've done it and had breaky with Mish at the bottom of the mountain

So steep.  So hard.

(I'll never forget that day!) ;)  I've done it so many times.  But nothing prepared me for today.

It took us 3.5 hours.  I was supposed to be running a group fitness test this morning after the walk and had to message the RSVP's to explain I was in the middle of Mt Coo-tha strapped with weights and couldn't make it in time.  I grossly underestimated how long it would take!

Every step was an effort.  Court, Bron and the B boys helped us down every step and called

The girls taking some sand out of Trace!

out when there was uneven ground.  We couldn't see our feet!  We stopped so many times I couldn't even begin to count.  Tracey had the best idea of releasing sand and chook feed along the way - brilliant - she released how many kg's she had lost each round.

Me on the other hand of course didn't think this through and mostly had hand weights which I couldn't leave in the bush.  Soon after we started I also realised I can't count and had accidentally strapped 46kg to myself!  I took 4kg of sand bags off me but I still did the walk with 42kg!  Bron took 3kg off me towards the end.  If I did it again I would do it differently but it's done now and you've gotta live and learn.

It was emotional for us all for our own personal reasons.  Us girls all even colour coordinated and wore the same shirts!  And as much as we all chatted, called Em, laughed and sang loudly to Katy Perry and Little Mix, it was completely a very

The gorgeous Em at the top of her mountain!

personal experience.  I personally have well and truly left my 40kg on Mt Coot-tha and as much as I will return to Mt Coot-tha I will not be regaining that 40kg, ever.  I can't believe I used to walk around like that.  We had to stop so many times to have a break because of the weird weights on us, but we realised that we would have had to stop that many times if we were 140kg as well!  We would have struggled just as much.

And, well, we realised that we actually would never have attempted the walk in the first place at 140kg.  And that's what it's all about - that's why we did it.  

Because now we can.  Bye bye 40kg xx

Enjoy some of our photos:

I did it! :)

Tracey's handiwork

My chook feed belt....awww

The beautiful Bron

The phenomenal Tracey

Me...weighing 141kg again!

The amazing Courts

Bron keeping an eye on a 50kg heavier than usual Tracey

Court tipping out some of my sand

Court and Kate

Me!

I felt so heavy.  I was so heavy!

Girls selfie

Our support crew, the B boys - Bob, Bill, me, Tracey and Courts

 

Starting to offload the weights at the end

Struggling - with Bron helping push me

Those of us who let stuff go on that mountain

An amazing photo from Em

Em tipping stuff her kg's out along the way

Em's view

Court helping me redistribute weight along the way

The beautiful Em!

Unhappy campers :)

Me taking a break lol

 

The yellow pole!

What I carried for 5km and up Kokoda

The current me!  The real me!

Thanks for sharing this with us Em!  Across 2 states xx