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I’m on the road this week so today’s newsletter is big on pictures and small on words. In my life away from Trail Runner Australia, I work as a consultant in leadership, strategy and digital transformation.

This week I’ve been working in Dili, the capital of Timor-Leste. It’s one of the newest and poorest nations in the world, located about an hour’s flight north-west of Darwin. It might be poor, but it has a certain ramshackle charm, the people are delightful and it has plenty of natural beauty.

While I’ve been here, I’ve been using my Sydney Marathon training to see the sights. And it’s reminded me how effective running is in both seeing the main landmarks of a place, and getting the vibe.

My running in Dili has been no different. I’ve run in the morning - pre-dawn because the sun doesn’t rise here until well after 6am - and seen people coming out onto the streets to start setting up for the day.

And I’ve run in the late afternoon when they have finished work and are enjoying an hour or so’s leisure time, mostly around the city’s foreshore. At both ends of the day there have been plenty of people exercising, many of them running. Some in shoes, some in thongs and some in bare feet.

The lack of a footpath is no deterrent (the general infrastructure here is pretty appalling…). Although the traffic seems chaotic, people just run or walk on the road when the footpath is non-existent or non-navigable. This isn’t controversial, people just make it work.

I’ve also felt very safe while in Dili. I’ve not come across any aggression from the locals towards me or each other. While I’m running they have either ignored me, or greeted me with a nod or a “hello” as I’ve run past. So that’s not much different from home.

Even my pre-dawn runs, when it’s been pitch black apart from the light from the streetlights that are working, have felt safe.

It’s not been great for the training program though. It’s hard to fulfill the purpose of a run when you are constantly pulling out your phone to take a snapshot. But in one respect it’s been great - heat acclimation.

This is supposed to boost performance and it’s hot and humid in Timor-Leste - 28 degrees Celcius doesn’t sound too bad as a maximum but it only drops to mid-20s overnight and the humidity is always high. So it’s always sticky and after every run I have been absolutely drenched.

The state of the footpaths has also been pretty hazardous. I lost some skin during one pre-dawn run when I tripped over a rock in the middle of the pavement it was too dark to see. Ironically I’d moved off the road and onto the pavement to avoid a three-wheeled motorcycle - a common work vehicle here - that had no headlights. Perhaps I should have taken my chances…

Timor-Leste is a deeply Catholic country with more than 95% of its 1.4m citizens identifying as Catholic. The recently deceased pope, Papa Francisco as he’s known here, is everywhere - on billboards, street murals and posters inside buildings.

Many of these commemorate Pope Francis’s visit to Timor-Leste in September 2024, which must have been one of the most exciting events in the nation’s history.

While I was running, I passed a number of services taking place just before and after dawn in the beautiful Church of Santo António de Motael, first established by the country’s former Portuguese colonists in the early 1800s.

In contrast to most of the buildings in the city, it’s in immaculate condition. Almost everywhere else you look, things are less well kept.

But despite the decrepit state of the infrastructure - for example, the water is unsafe to drink and sanitation standards leave a lot to be desired - I get the very strong feeling this is a nation looking to the future with optimism.

And given it’s history, it’s hardly surprising they want to look forward, not back. For several centuries it was a Portuguese colony. Then, in 1975 it broke free of that rule only to suffer under a brutal occupation by Indonesia.

Finally, in the late 1990s, self-determination was agreed to and as a consequence, Indonesia relinquished control. Timor-Leste became the first nation born in the 21st century when it formally came into being on 20 May 2002.

I’ve loved coming here. I hope I’ll get to visit again. And if I do, next time I’ll be checking out the trails that wind up into the mountains above the city. I am sure they will be spectacular.

Just quickly

Last weekend Western States was run in the US, one of the most highly anticipated ultra trail races in the world. I’d been keen to see how David Roche fared with his “attack the course with everything approach”.

As it happened, he had some issues and ended up DNFing. The men’s race was won by American Caleb Olson in a near course record of 14 hours 11 minutes, two minutes off Jim Walmsley’s course record.

Chris Myers (US) was second. The much anticipated return of Kilian Jornet (Spain), 14 years after he won the event, finished with him in third place, recording a time 80 minutes faster than he had in 2011.

Kiwi Dan Jones, who was also on my watchlist, performed brilliantly to finish fifth to complete a hat-trick of top five finishes.

Abby Hall won the women’s event in 16 hours 37 minutes, ahead of China’s Fuzhao Xiang (second for the second year running) and Marianne Hogan of Canada. It was a great result for Hall who suffered a badly broken leg while training in 2023.

Upcoming Events

There are way too many events for me to list everything that’s happening around the country, but here is a selection of upcoming races (with a bias towards South East Queensland).

The Running Calendar website is a great source if you want a comprehensive understanding of what’s available around Australia.