A few weeks back, I wrote about going into an event ready, giving you all the tips and advice you need to go in and smash it.

However, what I didn’t tell you about is that some things are just out of your control. And this past weekend, the desert reminded me of that in full bloody force.

Now, if you’ve been around a while, you know there’s one thing that’s been rattling around in my brain for the last three years — one unfinished chapter. The only blot on an otherwise solid OCR journey. That time I flew out to the desert, took on a beast of a course… and didn’t finish.

Ever since that moment, it has sat in my head like a gremlin with a grudge.

So last weekend? This was meant to be the redemption arc. The comeback story. The one where I ticked the last unticked box.

You know the type, picture an 80s movie, the star being battered around and beaten, cue training montage about 2/3 of the way in, and then going into the final 1/3 and destroying it.

Everything was lined up. Training was on point. The mindset was right. The gear was prepped. The food? Well… alright, there wasn’t pizza and beer involved (it was tough to find one that does vegan cheese), but I did have the backup plan, which was also a big old ribeye, a stack of rice and salad. Balance, right?

The plan was simple: get it done. Face the sand, face the past, and come home with the closure I’ve been chasing for years.

But the universe, as it turns out, had other plans.

The Fuel Fiasco

Now, in case you don’t know: when you’re tackling an endurance event that spans 4–5 hours, you need fuel. You should be bringing in 60–90g of carbs per hour from around the 90-minute mark. Otherwise, your body just stops cooperating. And not in a gentle “ooh I’m tired” way — I’m talking full-blown shutdown mode.

Now, I had it planned lovely, I was going to be refuelling every 60 minutes due to the heat. Hydration on point, bosh, we were ready.

So imagine this: 7K in, I’m already crawling up and down dunes under barbed wire, and it was at this point I hit the lowest mark and had a proper talking to myself halfway up one of the dunes, and I realise — all my fuel is gone. Lost somewhere out on course. No gels, no bars, no backup snacks. Just me, water, electrolytes, and whatever brain cells I had left, trying to negotiate with my legs.

I got past that and got my head back in the game, thinking right, let’s do this, I can stand there and tell the kids that look what you can achieve, etc, if you really want it.

By 11 or 12K, I’d taken on maybe 70kcal total. That’s less than a 2 Finger Kit Kat. My body hit the fuck it button. And that was that.

The Reality of Racing

Here’s the thing: I’d done everything right. All the training. All the prep. The right gear. The right intention. The right everything.

But sometimes you can do everything right, and it still goes to shit.

You can’t always control the outcome. But you can control how you respond.

Yeah, I was gutted. Emotional. A bit of a soft cunt to be honest. I’d been carrying this unfinished business for three years. I flew across the world to bury it. And instead, it kicked my arse all over again.

And yet — I’m beginning to become ok with that now.

The Lesson in Letting Go

Maybe the desert just doesn’t want me to finish. Maybe nature, or fate, or whatever you believe in, decided that this wasn’t the one.

It’s humbling, really. Like when you sit by the sea and realise how small you are — just a tiny speck against this massive, moving force. The desert is like that too. The land version of the sea. You don’t conquer it. You experience it. And sometimes, it spits you out. And that’s okay.

There’s no shame in walking away when your body’s shutting down.

There’s no failure in not finishing when circumstances pull the rug from under you.

There’s no weakness in resting when you know there’s nothing left to give.

So what now?

I take the lessons. I process the disappointment. I allow myself the feelings.

But I don’t need to go back and rectify it anymore. (For now)

Not every story needs the ending you imagined. Sometimes just being in the story, just showing up, is enough.

The desert still stands.

And so do I.