“You have a few moments when your alarm goes off at 5.30am and it’s pitch black outside, you put your feet on the carpet and think ‘why am I doing this?’”
Dave Oliver then visualises standing on the start line of UltraMan Australia, the three-day endurance race, which for most mornings last summer, was the reason
he got up before sunrise to run, bike or swim. That mental image would push the 35-year-old to his feet. He would ride his bike to the pool, swims 200 lengths and sometime around 8.30am he would sit down at his office desk to begin his working day.
After work, Dave would run a half marathon. He would return to his Mount Victoria home at 7.30pm, leaving only enough time to say a tired hello to his flatmate, cook dinner and prepare tomorrow’s training gear and sleep.
Dave isn’t your average triathlete. In fact, he only fell into the sport four years ago after making a pact with a friend to knock off an IronMan triathlon from the bucket list.
“It was 2008 and I was working in Rotorua as a helicopter pilot at the time. A friend and I went to Taupo for a night out and it happened to be IronMan weekend. We were eating kebabs on the sideline, watching what looked like normal people finish in 16-plus hours. We wondered whether two guys who could barely swim and who had never done a triathlon, could finish an IronMan.”
Dave wasn’t foreign to sport. He played rugby in his twenties, enjoyed mountain biking and had completed a marathon “in no spectacular time”. After working as a helicopter pilot, particularly in hot spots like Papua New Guinea, it’s fair to assume he also isn’t afraid of high pressure situations.
He ignored the pact until 2012 when he entered his first triathlon in the local series at Scorching Bay.
Since then, triathlon has overtaken Dave’s life and transformed his understanding of what’s possible.
Time spent watching TV and long sleep-ins – time he retrospectively calls “junk time” – was swapped for running, cycling and swimming.
Dave was training for up to 20 hours a week. Unsurprisingly, his social life took a hit. His mates thought he was mad when after a meal out, Dave would change into his running gear, and in the pouring rain, run the 10km home.
He admits in the early days he didn’t have the balance right, sacrificing time with friends and family to train. Time management, often touted by triathletes as the hidden fourth discipline, was something he learned with time.
“I’ve made a conscience decision not to let my training affect my social life too much. I still manage to prioritise going out for a beer with mates every now and then.”
He’s also adept at stealing training opportunities. For example, a visit with his mum in Palmerston North turns into a training ride to Otaki where they’ll meet for lunch.
The life-training balance was made easier last year when he traded in his month-on, month-off helicopter pilot job for regular hours managing a
eronautical publications.
It took just two triathlon seasons before Dave felt ready to take on IronMan New Zealand. In 2014, he completed the 3.8km swim, 180km cycle and 42.2km run in 10 hours 45 minutes.
The first-time IronMan ranked in the top 20 percent of finishers. Dave, it seems, had a talent.
“I did it again the next year. I was faster. But that race destroyed me. I just pushed way too hard, too early. After the race, I was standing there in a world of hurt. I couldn’t think or function. My sister had to take my shoes off.”
Despite the painful race, Dave continued his daily training regime with local triathlon squad Traction Fitness. It wasn’t really training, he says. It was something he did for fun. And seven months later, he applied for UltraMan Australia on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.
UltraMan Australia is an endurance race covering 515km in three days, and is open to only 40 competitors. Dave didn’t think too much about it when his application was accepted, choosing to focus more on enjoying training.
About 12 weeks out from UltraMan, things got serious. He’d train up to 24 hours a week. A 7km ocean swim after work was not unusual, nor was a 180km Sunday bike ride.
Training wasn’t without its challenges. There was constant laundry, dietary restrictions, energy-sapping headwinds, strained muscles, punctures, choppy seas with the occasional jellyfish and those early morning wake up calls.
But Dave is remarkably philosophical about it all. “It’s nothing you can’t work around,” he says. Besides, it’s good practice for race day when you never know what obstacles you’ll face.
What’s striking about Dave is not his physical accomplishments, but his attitude towards them. He speaks ambivalently about his punishing training regime. And when probed about his toughest sessions, he reframes the experience in a way that is constructive.
He recalls this year’s Marlborough Grape Ride, remembered by cyclists mostly for its miserable conditions:
“I did the 2-lap, 200km course, plus I was staying in Picton so had to cycle 40km to the start. It was 4.10am, raining and the first thing I’m faced with is the hill leading out of Picton.”
He shrugs.
“But you need some terrible training experiences. I would draw on what sounds like a negative thing and turn it into a positive because I know it’s going to be fuelling my motivation in UltraMan. It’s like a pocket of motivation.”
He knew he’d need all the motivation he could get for UltraMan.
Day one was a 10km swim, the equivalent of swimming from Freyberg Beach to Petone Foreshore, followed by a 140km cycle, the distance between Wellington and Palmerston North. Day two was 281.1km on the bike and day three equalled back-to-back marathons, covering 84.3km.
“I never thought UltraMan was a crazy thing to do. I never thought about the distances. I just treated the long cycle like a nice social ride. It was much more of
a mental game than a physical one.”
Dave finished sixth with an overall time of 24 hours, 48 minutes.
“I was stoked, exhausted and a little bit emotional. It was a surreal moment. It had been my only focus in the world and that’s it. It was done.”
Photo: Dayle Jordan
Dave swears he enjoyed some quality Netflix time after the race, and tucked into a burger or two. But he hasn’t strayed too far from Traction Fitness and his daily training sessions.
This month, just four months after UltraMan, he will compete in IronMan Wales.
“I’m really looking forward to an awesome day out at IronMan Wales. Apparently it’s an amazing course and I’ll have the Welsh side of the family there cheering me on.
Dave bats away the suggestion that what he’s done is extraordinary arguing “it’s all relative to where you’ve come from and what you believe in”. He maintains he’s a “typical Wellingtonian” who drinks too much coffee at The Hangar and has a serious weak spot for Pandoro’s croissants.
“I don’t see my lifestyle as any different to someone else with a time-consuming hobby. At the end of the day, most of my weekends are spent with mates having a good time. It’s just that we’re usually swimming, biking or running.”
This article was originally published in Capital magazine, Spring 2016
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