Run Richard, run!
Is Richard Bowles Australia’s answer to Forrest Gump? The ultra-runner is taking on an epic 5330km, and plans to complete it in just under six months. So what is driving him to run so far and why does he cringe when asked the question?
By Virginia Millen
Richard Bowles wasn’t always a runner. Before he moved to Australia almost 11 years ago, he never ran. So, what happened in that decade that led Richard to embark on a six-month run along the east coast of Australia? And why is he doing it?
Why? Is a question most endurance athletes and adventurers are repeatedly asked. And, they get sick of answering it. So I’m not surprised when Richard sighs heavily when asked that dreaded question just a stone’s throw away from the Heidelberg trails that he runs religiously.
The question, however, is inevitable. Running the length of the Bicentennial National Trail, from Healesville, Victoria to Cooktown, Queensland – a distance of 5330km – in five and a half months, beggars belief. But for the passionate distance runner and running coach, this adventure is a natural progression.
“I really enjoy running. So much so, that I run every day,” says Richard. “So, I thought, why not go and do that as my job. Because essentially that’s what it is, it’s like a job.”
Born in the UK, Richard Bowles “never ran as a kid”. “Back in the UK I did what most young people did. I went out and partied,” he says.
It wasn’t until he got a taste of the ancient trails of South America on one of his many overseas trips that Richard unearthed a connection with the outdoors and an attraction to the physicality that simply can’t be found anywhere else.
“I did a lot of the trails in Patagonia, Argentina and Machu Pichu in Peru. I found that when I was hiking the trails, I was trying to finish them as quickly as possible. So if they said it was going to take four days, I’d do it in three,” says Richard. “I guess I discovered a bit of a competitive streak. I liked the challenge.”
Once in Australia, Richard began participating in running competitions. “I got into the local fun runs – five kilometres, 10km, that sort of stuff, and realised I was quite good at it,” he says.
Like many runners, when Richard had cracked the shorter distances, he tried out a half-marathon and then a marathon, and then... “And then if you’re silly enough, you go further,” he says.
Going further takes runners into lung-busting, leg-burning endurance territory – anything over marathon distance – and almost inevitably leads runners off the road and onto the trail. Richard has stayed there ever since. In some ways he felt it had taken him full circle.
“The nature of the longer-distance stuff put me on the trail and I thought, well, this is actually better anyway. This is taking me back to South America,” he says. “Every step on the trail is completely different and now I don’t like to run anywhere else.”
And, it was while on the trail that he came up with the idea to run for six months.
To read the rest of this article, see issue #30 of Outer Edge magazine..
