Visit to Vege-land

Next stop.. and Number 44 of the Challenge took me to the heart of New Zealand's top vegetable growing area - Pukekohe.

Another road half and expecting it to probably be a bit up and down... I wasn't disappointed.

The first nice surprise though was being met at the start area by local resident Steve Neary. Steve wasn't running and offered to be Lainy and Kate's guide for the day.

Also living locally and down for the days run was the lovely Laurie Wilson, Laurie and Chris lived just up the road, although Chris's knee wouldn't allow him to run. Rebecca Edgecombe was there yet again... she must have nearly run 52 events herself and Mike Duckett to make up the numbers!

The run starts with a quick out and back in the opposite direction to the main part of the course to make up the correct distance... so Lainy and Kate got to get the good pics, then go for morning tea with Steve... before following me around the course with cameras.

After a winding procession through Pukekohe town we were out into the country and steadily climbing... the course just gradually climbed all of the way to about 14km.

The weather was hot and fine and I had a pretty good day. By the time we got to the highest point of the course we had a few nice views.

Then the descent, not steep enough to damage the knees, but enough to up the pace a bit. I got quite lucky in the last couple of km's as I was running just behind, then just in front of and then just behind a bloke from Australia who had entered on a whim while here on holiday.

I was keeping a reasonably steady pace and he was a surger... in the end we pushed each other to the end a bit quicker than either of us would probably have gone otherwise. He had too much for me in the end, but a time of 1:45:31 was good enough.

We picked up our bag of veges that every finisher got and headed up to Steve's house for a shower and a tour of his fabulous Beer Museum... I was blown away by the fabulous collection he has... especially att the Tennent's Beer Memorabilia! A massive thanks to Steve for being a fantastic host for my girls for the day.

Then back for a very pleasant prizegiving and a chat with friends, and off home with another in the books!