The Pyramid Challenge

Walsh's Pyramid is about twenty five kilometres south of Cairns on the Bruce Highway near the town of Gordonvale. At 922 metres tall, its striking triangular shape is a local landmark and it is well known and distinctly recognisable. Each year hundreds of competitors voluntarily run up the pyramid and back down again in the Great Pyramid Race.

The Cairns Post journalist Ben Blomfield and myself were assigned to a story to preview the 2010 Walsh's Pyramid Race in Gordonvale. To gain a first person account of what its like to climb Walsh's Pyramid, Ben and I did exactly that, although while the majority of entrants run the whole way up (not to mention the extra 10km's from and back to Gordonvale) we took a more modest approach and struggled to walk up the monster in an hour and a half. In the time it took us to just get up the mountain, the best competitors had run ten kilometres, made it up and down the mountain, and had been resting for ten to fifteen minutes!

The record for the race is held by Neil Labinsky, who has completed the entire race course in one hour and fifteen minutes. Neil won the 2010 race on Saturday, claiming his third Pyramid title, as well a cool thousand bucks.

Ben Blomfield (aka Bear Grills) after conquering Walsh's Pyramid.
Photograph ©Sean Davey/The Cairns Post

http://pyramidrace.com

Watch a video of our (mis)adventure to the top of Walsh's Pyramid here