WISE WORDS
ERCHANA MURRAY-BARTLETT
ATHLETE / ADVENTURER / SPEAKER I was born in Canberra (ACT) but mostly grew up in the Yarra Valley in Victoria. I moved out after high school when I was offered a scholarship to play soccer in the US. After completing university, I then spent a large chunk of my 20s travelling. When I was based back home though, I rented an apartment in Melbourne. That was basically home right up until Tip to Toe kicked off in 2022. Since finishing back in January, I’ve been living on the Gold Coast; I love the proximity to the beach and the hinterlands!
Recently breaking a record for most marathons in a row was one of the most memorable days of my life! The record at the time was 106 consecutive marathons, and it had been broken a few times in the past two years so I knew it was a popular one to chase. It was a funny preparation, because Guinness took a few months to get back to me with the guidelines for what I would need to verify the record. In fact, they still hadn’t return my enquiry on the eve of my first day, so rather panicked I messaged the current record holder asking for help!
The best part about being somewhere new is exploring all the new trails and mountains. So far, I’ve spent a fair bit of time in Binna Burra National Park and have fallen in love with a few of the longer trail loops up there. It’s such a different landscape to what I grew up with. The river crossing, waterfalls and wildlife make for an incredible (but very technical) run.
It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, running a marathon every single day. But as soon as I hit 99, I was determined, I felt strong, and the last 8 marathons were a breeze. I ran my 107th – the record breaking marathon – in Newcastle, surrounded by the incredible community and Newcastle run clubs who came down to support me. My parents drove 7 hours to be at the finish line too. It was a day that equalled in significance to finally arriving in Melbourne, 43 days later.
When I was living in Victoria though, I had a long list of favourite trails. My ultimate go-to is the Warburton Rail Trail, as the backdrop is stunning and it’s a fast, easy run. Growing up in the Yarra Valley, that had endless trail running. The track to the summit of Mount Donna Buang and the bike tracks through Seville were some well-worn ones for me. They’re close to my heart because I could just leave my house, and within a few hundred metres I was already emersed in the bush. Why do I love trail running? Because it combines all my favourite things – friendship, exercise and the outdoors. I love running through the wilderness because pace becomes less important, time becomes irrelevant and instead, you only focus on the moment you’re in. The trail running community is so supportive, so beautiful, so passionate, it’s just so infectious to be around.
98
My goal for Tip to Toe (running from the tip of Qld to Melbourne) was to raise $10 per kilometre I ran, which would have been a tad over $60,000. In the end, I was able to raise over $132,000! My partner charity is The Wilderness Society, and my overall goal within this was to shed light on the current extinction crisis being faced by Australian wildlife. One of my key focuses during Tip to Toe was identifying the at-risk wildlife localised in the regions I was running through; we have a representative animal for each state and territory, and unfortunately each state and territory’s representative fauna I passed through is now endangered. In terms of younger runners making a mark in trail running, Australia is very young in embracing the competitive trail racing scene.
In fact, even I didn’t really know how to progress in a global competition sense until very recently. I think young Aussies have so much potential on a global scale because we have the terrain and the space to train properly and the athlete resources to promote performance. I think it’s a great time for young runners to dive in to the trail scene. It’s a booming sport and I can’t wait to watch it emerge here in Australia in the coming years. If there’s one place in the world I’d want to run through, where would that be? I lived in the USA for a while and have since been back and visited some of the east coast national parks – it opened a world to trail running I hadn’t seen before. The environment across the US was so different to any landscape I’d seen in anywhere else. I remember being blown away by Arches National Park, Zion National Park and Yellowstone. I feel like I could spend an entire decade exploring and still not see everything properly. I’ll definitely be aiming for an American ultra soon, they look menacing – particularly Badwater. Beverly Sills, the opera singer, famously said ‘there are no shortcuts to anywhere worth going.’ I truly believe that we should embrace hard work, because if you conquer something hard, you emerge stronger – both physically and mentally, you grow, you learn and you become more resilient. I believe embracing and accepting that hard things will only add value to your life will help overcome a hurdle a lot of people face in carving opportunities for themselves. Most successful people have put in the hard yards to get where they are today. PBs are hard, but don’t they feel bloody great when you achieve them? Tip to Toe was the hardest thing I’ve done, but because of that, it was hands down the most rewarding when I achieved it.
