Hong Kong 298km Four Trails: Chamelia Suhra goes from ‘party queen’ to running machine in two years, swapping heels for sports shoes
- The Hong Kong-based Indonesian only heard of the Four Trails Ultra Challenge a year ago and shed tears after being accepted for the race
- The 298km run links all four of Hong Kong’s major trails, in one go, with no support or checkpoints
Chamelia Suhra is tackling one of the hardest ultra marathons on earth only two years after taking up running. The Hong Kong-based business owner has ticked off massive distances in the past 24 months, in time to be accepted for the 298km Hong Kong Four Trails Ultra Challenge (HK4TUC).
“My family, I haven’t told them. They wouldn’t believe me. They don’t believe I’m turning myself to sport because I was the party queen,” Suhra said. “When I lived in Singapore, I was partying seven days a week. I didn’t own any sports shoes. And, now all my heels are hiding, replaced by sports shoes.”
The HK4TUC, starting on February 2, links all four of Hong Kong’s major trails – the MacLehose, Wilson, Hong Kong and Lantau Trails. They run them in reverse, and there are no checkpoints or support allowed on the trails. The runners do get help moving between the trails. They are not allowed headphones or music, hiking poles or painkillers.
If they reach the end, marked by the green postbox in Mui Wo, in under 60 hours, they are deemed a “finisher”. If they reach the end in under 72 hours, they are a “survivor”.
Suhra only heard about the HK4TUC a year ago. She was supporting a friend on the final 30km of the HK100 when some of the HK4TUC runners sped past her, just a few kilometres into the 298km epic.
She asked who they were, and her friend explained the challenge.
What is the 298km Hong Kong Four Trails Ultra Challenge?
“On my God, that is crazy,” she thought. “I didn’t think I could run that long. I had never even run 100 miles (160km).”
Suhra entered her first race of any kind in January 2019 when she signed up for the Sai Kung 50km. “It was my first, I signed up blindly. It was just ego, I just wanted to show my friends I could run, and not just party,” she said.
Suhra finished and thought it was the longest she would ever run. She signed up for a King of the Hills event, and met some members of the Gone Runners group. After joining, and being added to the WhatsApp group, she was blown away by some of the distances these runners were doing.
The Gone Runners often organise their own challenges, including one involving continuous laps up and down Mount Parker. It was Suhra’s first major challenge and for some reason a stubbornness surfaced.
“I read two years ago, some guy had set the record and I thought someone needs to do something about that,” she said. “Everyone said they’d do five loops, six loops. My big mouth said 11 loops. I said it blindly, and I regretted it. And I beat the record, 110km [held by Rory Mitchell].”
“I thought, I’m gonna be the last person standing but I regretted it so much as everyone went home and I kept going. It took me almost 24 hours,” she said.
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She returned the next weekend and completed another 60km worth of loops, successfully accumulating the height of Everest in total over the two weekends.
Since then, Suhra has run several 100 milers. She ran 100 miles doing loops of Bowen Road and Black Links. She ran the 9 Buffaloes, which links the 100km TransLantau and LT70 courses. It took her 44 hours in the summer heat. She returned when it was cooler in September and did it again in 37 hours.
“I’m just getting really stubborn. A DNF [did not finish] is not in my vocabulary,” she said.
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Applying the stubbornness to running is new, but her stubbornness itself is not. “Always, if I’ve said I should do something, I will finish it no matter what. I think it came from my grandmother, she has the same attitude, very stubborn. All my aunts they say I look like her, I’m the same as her in everything,” Suhra said.
“Every time I run, I think I can do this, every time I feel tired, I say don’t be such a wimp, you can do this, you chose to do this.”
Suhra applied to run the HK4TUC after her first 9 Buffaloes. She got a reply the next day. She was scared to open it just in case she had been rejected. “But I got the spot and I cried. I don’t believe it myself, I’m going to run 298km,” Suhra said.
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She does not have a specific completion time in mind. “I just want to go out there and have fun. When I run I don’t have any targets. I can do this, but the question is how many hours. We’ll find out on the day. I never target a time, as if I have a time and I might not make it then it will stress me out,” Suhra said.
It is a very different notion of fun to the simple pleasures of party life. “I don’t party at the moment. On New Year’s Eve, I was running the Wilson Trail in reverse. I partied at the Stanley Gap on the Wilson Trail as it struck midnight,” Suhra added.
