MOST kids growing up in Sydney spent at least some of their childhood going to the Sydney Cricket Ground, either going to the rugby league, rugby union internationals and the cricket.
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There was only one place to watch the action from and that was the famous “Hill” – now long gone – with all the buzz and excitement perhaps magnified in the minds of a young bloke who was loving the fact he was there with his hero, his dad.
When you consider it, hills have always been part of the Australian lingo, either as part of the name we give a place, in terms of our diggers and gallantry or to describe athletes who are generally considered to be past their prime.
Over the last 12 months I have made some major steps forward in my health, including dropping 25 kilograms. So taking part in Sunday’s Border Mail Fed Hill Challenge seemed like a natural progression – I’d rather be over the hill than under it.
But whoever called Fed Hill a “hill” must have been the master of the euphemism.
The challenge started easily enough and the one-kilometre and then two-kilometre markers came around quickly enough.
I then went up a challenging rise, which I assumed was “The Hill”. But I was wrong.
The next rise was even more challenging but when I found out again that this was not “The Hill” I started to get worried.
Not much later I finally got a sight of the challenge ahead, as Fed Hill reared up from the ground like some threatening Mount Everest. At that time I had just reached a water station, which immediately took on the appearance of some sort of Himalayan base camp at the foot of the monster.
At this stage I noticed runners coming back towards me and my immediate thought was that they were cowards running away in fear. It did not do my confidence much good when I found out that they had not only conquered their fear but were racing back to the finish line, with barely a sweat.
But on I trudged, finally prepared to take the hill – or have the hill take me, my cause not helped when I came across a sign informing me the “hill” had a gradient the same as Mount Bogong.
Not long after that I came across a couple of military types - Andrew Russell and Ben Clifton – carrying big packs on their back. I reckon it would give them the Edgars if I asked how much the packs weighed, because they must have spent all morning answering the same question, but I did anyway.
They didn’t mind me asking and in fact the whole idea was for people to ask them so that they had the chance to let people know about a cause very dear to them, veteran’s suicide.
Apparently since 2009 we have lost 43 Australian soldiers from enemy action but 98 have taken their own lives. Which is a very sad state of affairs.
I had told myself that if I got to the top of Fed Hill I was going to do a “Rocky dance” but after speaking to Andrew and Ben, I lost all inclination to do so, given their efforts on the day and why they were putting themselves through so much pain.
I beat the boys home but then joined the large crowd in cheering them as they crossed the finish line.
I guess the lesson was that, in life, what most of us see as mountains do turn out to be, in fact, nothing more than molehills. But for others, when we see no challenges at all, there are terrifying mountains to climb.
And like Andrew and Ben, we all need to be prepared to share the load of helping others overcome their own personal mountains.