Trail Mix | What was your most memorable run of 2019 – Hongkongers share their highlights, from Moontrekker and Oxfam Trailwalker, to apps and finding a home

When it was announced in November, two days before the race, that this year’s 100km Oxfam Trailwalker had been cancelled, the last thing I wanted to do was run. The event had been shelved because of logistical problems posed by the ongoing protests, but scores of competitors said they planned to run the race unofficially.

Come race morning on Friday November 15, several dozen teams had gathered at Pak Tam Chung in Sai Kung. People milled about in their team kit and some even had their race bibs on. Runners were busy sorting out their snacks, gels, and hydration, and others were casually standing around chatting about the hilly kilometres ahead of them.

At precisely 7:55am, a whistle pierced the air. It was Dave Jacquier, of Joint Dynamics. “Five minutes!” he yelled, taking on the role of rallying everyone to the start line of the inaugural unofficial Oxfam Trailwalker. All around, there was an atmosphere of jovial bemusement.

At the strike of 8am, the loudhailer was blown. Dozens of runners rushed forward, embarking on what was essentially a “fat arse” ultra trail marathon and turning a major institutionalised event into an unofficial but eminently memorable occasion. Many later remarked that this was testament to the resilient spirit of Hong Kong’s trail-running community. If nothing else, the day will surely be remembered.

The unofficial Oxfam Trailwalker stands out to me as the most memorable run of 2019. I asked several local runners about what their most memorable running experiences were. Here’s what they shared:

Atishi Batra

The Barclays Moontrekker Moonlit 30km race in October is a 2019 stand-out for Batra, a Hong Kong-based designer and trail runner. She had been training hard and preparing assiduously for her first night race and her longest race distance ever. One thing made it more challenging, however: the only day she could have got out to recce the course also happened to be a day when the entire MTR system was shut down.

“So, I did the next best thing and broke down the Strava route into checkpoint to checkpoint segments and planned my splits in detail. By the end of it, I had three target times: competitive, challenging, conservative,” she said. “I was going for challenging and I was hitting all of my splits within minutes.”