Taroko Half Marathon and Inaugural Taiwan Cup

Friday night I finished class at 9:10, hopped on the back of Paul’s scooter, and raced towards the Taoyuan High Speed Rail. Around 9:45 we arrived, I ran inside trying to make the 9:50 train.

I paid for my ticket at an automated kiosk unaware that I would get my change back in coins. Shouldn’t have broken a 1000 on a 150 NT ticket; haha, oh well. I grab my hundred some odd coins and ran downstairs. Just missed it. The next one came about 20 minutes later.

Luckily, I got to Taipei and was still able to secure a seat on the train to Hualien at 11:50 at night. I boarded the train and read most of the way to Hualien and arrived at the station around 2:45 AM.

I met up with Chrissy and Bonnie outside the station and we took a cab to the hotel. By the time we got to our room, it was 3:15 in the morning. We discussed if we were even going to try to sleep, and after agreeing we laid down for a solid 40 minute nap before our wake up call came shortly afterwards at 4:20 AM.

We ll got dressed and headed out to make our way to Taroko. We jumped in a cab outside the hotel and started making out way to the train station, which was only around 5 minutes away. The cab driver was going a different way than when we were dropped off earlier, but that’s how cabs are – they all have the “fastest route”. Whatever, we let it be.

Unfortunately, our decision to let it be became an issue minutes later. We realized that the driver thought we wanted him to take us directly to Taroko, about 40 minutes away from Hualien. Since we had free transfers, we weren’t about to pay 700 NT  for a cab. Multiple attempts later, he finally understood that he was going in the wrong direction.

The only train would leave Hualien at 5:30 sharp. It was 5:20 and we were quite a ways outside of town. He took his sweet time returning, and my temper was about to boil over. I was going to be pissed if I spent all night traveling half way around the island, not sleeping, only to have an ignorant cab driver screw it up and make us miss the marathon (one I wasn’t too stoked to be doing anyways, due to lack of training and not really knowing the girls I was crashing with).

Side note, the park wasn’t allowing cabs inside due to traffic reasons, so if we missed this train, we wouldn’t be running. We get back near Hualien and the clock is at 5:27 AM. We get stuck at a railroad crossing and are convinced it’s over. Finally, the train passes, and we pull into the station.

People are running towards the gate from every direction. We get out throw some money at the driver and join the masses in an attempt to catch the train. We squeezed into a car as the doors were closing and made the cut. Stressful start to the race.

The race started by heading away from the gorge for about 2 km before turning around and heading straight into the park. Once inside the park, stunning views emerged around every turn.

Around 5 or 6 km into the race the grade started to kick up. Uphill we go. My cardio was in top form from cycling so much, but my legs were not feeling too hot. I paced myself off a Taiwanese man for the better part of the climb, and once he tapered off, I pushed through until the turnaround.

We were offered helmets just before the turnaround due to falling rocks. I saw no one take one, so I followed suit and headed on without. Luckily that wasn’t an issue during the race.

I finished just under/around 1:50. Not great by any means, but not terrible considering the course was straight uphill and downhill and running 3 times in the previous 5 months before the race. I am satisfied with the time and how I felt in the days afterwards.

After the race, the three of us went back to the hotel, showered and then grabbed a bite to eat before chilling in the room. The girls both passed out shortly after and I read and watched a movie. The rest of the day was low-key and I passed out around 8:30 that night.

Sunday morning I woke up around 7 AM and left to find the staging area for the inaugural Taiwan Cup. It’s a cycling race, which attracted some teams from all over the world.

After finding the start, I went back to the hotel, grabbed my things and said my goodbyes to the girls. After a few failed attempts at finding a place to rent a scooter, I stopped by a breakfast shop to ask for directions.

Three women argued for a few minutes, I guess, about the best place, one gave me a helmet and told me to get on her scooter. Looks like she would personally be driving me to one – sweet! I love Taiwanese people; they are so friendly.

After getting turned down from a few due to not having a license, we finally found someone who would rent to me. She said her goodbyes, I thank her profusely and we went our separate ways.

I made it back to the course just in time for the parade of police, race organizers and eventually cyclists to pass by. Took a few snap shots and then headed up to Taroko.

Once in Taroko I spent my time driving though the gorge, pulling off doing short hikes (more like paths, but still impressive) and chilling down by the river in a secluded spot off the trail. It was an awesome day exploring the area and is a remarkable place.

I caught a train back to Chungli around 4 PM and arrived back home by around 7:30. It was a tiring weekend, but a ton of fun and I’m stoked that I actually went and did it.