The 2016 World Trail Running Championships were held in Peneda-Geres National Park in northern Portugal.

I trained so hard for this race. I got a coach for the first time ever. Being such a busy person I never thought I had time to respect a program, so always just did my own thing. But this was my second World Champs and I wanted to give it a good crack. Within the first month or two of coaching, I had a new 5km PB and a new half-marathon PB. I won numerous races with new course records.

I was named the captain of the female Australian team for World’s, and I was really excited at my own potential. The week before the race we recce’d a lot of the course. It was highly technical — something that concerned me slightly — but it was also an aspect of trail running that I had really improved over the last few years. My coach praised my running style but did make the comment that he hadn’t seen me ‘let loose’ on the technical stuff just yet. I told him I was saving it for race day. And that I did. But unfortunately, that meant a rolled ankle in the first 10km. Then again at 13km. Then again at 25km. And then it didn’t stop. Both ankles went. Luckily the right one stayed strong so I could still hobble along. But it got to the point that I could no longer run downhill. I could still hike strongly and was overtaking people on the ups. But they’d get me straight back on the downs. I thought I had done some serious damage, but there was never any thought of quitting. I had no plans for my first DNF. I would walk if I had to.

I came 30th in that race. 30th in the world — my friends were supportive and kept trying to remind me of that. But when you’ve worked so hard for something, and you are fitter than you’ve ever been in your life, it’s so bloody frustrating to be restricted in performing at your potential. I look back now and realise that I have had a great running career. I have not had many bad races or serious injuries. I had to have a bad one at some point, it was just a shame it had to happen at a World Championship event. But: onward and upwards to new challenges. I plan to go back to World’s in 2017 and then on to the next challenge of a longer event — the Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc. I CANNOT WAIT.

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