WORLD 100KM MASTERS – COURSE, HEAT AND HUMIDITY

Flights booked, trip planned and my
bags are nowhere near packed.

I am now only 10 days away from my
third 100km event, the World Masters 100km title in Bengaluru, India. (35- 39
years)

My first attempt at 100km didn’t end that well with a DNF at
50km mark at the Sri Chinmoy Self- Transcendence event in Christchurch, New Zealand.

I learnt a lot about myself during this event. Number 1, I wasn’t
a big fan of smaller loops and number 2, I needed to work on my mental strength.
 

I got my second opportunity 7 weeks later at the Australia
Day Ultra, and this would be only three afters Bruny Ultra 64km.

Looking back, I should have never run this event, but I was
impatient and wanted to get 100km time on the board.

I ended up running 9 hours on the dot, this could have
easily been a sub 9 hours If I hadn’t of cramped in the last 300m of the race.

Was I happy with this result? No

Did I learn more about myself? Yes

If anything, I walked about from this race, and learnt despite
having a bad day with cramps and tights quads.  I could still run 100km even when it got hard.
I have one mantra now when running. 

“Put one foot in front of another and you are still moving forward”

I finished this event, and I had injured my hip flexor and
this put me out for a number of weeks before being able to start my next prep for the Comrades Marathon. 

I still had unfinished business in the 100km distance and I
knew that I wanted to do another one this year.

This week will be two years since my first Ultra marathon,
during this time, I have run 2 x Bruny 64km, 2 x Comrades 89km, 1 x 50km in New
Zealand and 1 x 100km Australia Day Ultra. 

These last 24 months, I have learnt a lot, and I still have
so much more to learn.  Despite not
having a World Championship senior qualifier, I still put my hat in the ring
and put an application in for the upcoming world Championships in Bangalore,
India.

 I wasn’t surprised that I didn’t
get selected with only 9-hour 100km time posted during the qualifying period.  

The C qualifier is 7 hours and 40 minutes, and this year 7 hours and 35 minutes was good enough for selection. 

I have a 6 hours and 58 minutes and 7 hours and 10 minutes for 89km events, and both these courses had 1300 to 1700 elevation.   

I don’t think it’s too much a stretch to suggest on my day
that I am capable of sub-8-hour 100km performance if it goes my way.  

The next best thing was put an entry in for the World masters 100km titles, and this are run at the same time as the World 100km titles.  

It was best of both worlds, I may not have got selected in Worlds team, but I still get to race the best 100km athletes on the globe.

The event itself is held in on the Agricultural Sciences
campus in Bengaluru.

There will be 21 runners in my 35-39 years masters age group; by looking at some of their results, these guys are much better athletes than me.

I look at this as a good thing, and I will be chasing these guys/ majority
of the field as soon as gun fires.

The course is flat, fast and run on asphalt/dirt roads.

Please see attached a YouTube video of the course.  (25)
2024 IAU 100km World Championships – Race route | Bengaluru, India – YouTube
)

You will notice that 70% of course is run in the shade. 

The heat in India during the event has been playing on my
mind, luckily, we are going into their winter, and it won’t be as harsh as India’s
summer.

At present, race day is saying a max of 28 degrees and 60 %
humidity.  

I have been training indoors the past couple of weeks on an elliptical
trainer and going to the sauna for 1 hour most days of the week to try and
acclimatize the best I can.  

I am realist and I am well aware this going to play a huge
part in how well I race on the day.

Instead of racing, it
most likely come down to surviving.

My goal of a sub-8-hour 100km is firmly set, and I will start
off at this pace regardless.  

I only live once and what is the point of playing it safe?

Until next time, Happy running.

COMRADES TOUR, TWO TIME SILVER MEDALIST, AND THE UPS AND DOWNS OF RACE DAY.

I am writing this final Comrades blog on my second flight of four from Johnsonburg to Dubai before finally landing in Tasmania on Thursday morning 10:00 a.m.

Forgive me if this one has a few more mistakes than usual as it is currently 11:28 p.m. South African time.  

Since the last blog I was on the way to Durban after being in Dullstroom for nearly 4 weeks.  

After a full day’s travel, I finally made it to my hotel in Umhlanga, this is about 20 minutes away from the start line and I stayed here last year.

I chose the same tour company and hotel as this was familiar and it was situated in really nice location that is close to the beach/ shopping mall.

It’s like the old saying- “if it is not broken, don’t fix it”

I checked into the hotel at 6:00 p.m. and was greeted by some staff that remembered me from last year which was pretty cool.  It must have been the beard 😉

I went to bed early as I had to be up by 6:00 a.m. to start the Bruce Fordyce tour.

The bus would follow the exact route that we would race on Sunday.

 Bruce along with his friend Frank who has several silver medals and over 50 races between them would show us the course and give us tips along the way.  I had a fair idea what I was in for as had run last years event but it was nice to get a refresher.

 If I was to be honest, I think I was more scared about what was coming.

 During the tour I met another runner by the name of Shaun from Australia who had run all the marathon majors and was also doing his second Comrades Marathon.  

We chatted about last year’s run and what our goals were, we would later see each other post event in the international tent. 

It was really interesting hearing some of the history behind the event, and if you have ever watched / listened to Bruce, you would know that he has a great sense of humour and is a really likeable person along with being a phenomenal runner.   (9 x time winner)

We approached the Valley of Thousand Hills and stopped at Arthurs Seat and The Wall of Honour, here I was able to get a photo of my plaque with my name on it and a few selfies which I was extremely excited about and had been waiting to do since this time last year.

It was great tour and I would highly recommend this to anyone doing the Comrades marathon for the first time. 

The same day I picked up my race bib, I had quick look at the expo, got some merch and went straight back to my hotel to rest up knowing that Friday night is the most important night’s sleep as the chances of you sleeping the night before are slim with lots of nervous energy.

I got a solid 8 hours sleep and went to straight to the same Parkrun as last year and did my final shake out run before race day. 

I met up with a South African by the name of Wilhelm who now resides in Hobart and has done 18 Comrades Marathons.   We had been speaking on / off the last year and it was nice to finally put a face to a name. 

We chatted about our experiences and how amazing this event is, wished each other luck and both went on our way. Mac would later run 11 hours and 44 hours and earn his 19^th medal which is amazing.

That night I was finally able to fall asleep by 11 p.m., before the alarm went off at 3:00 a.m.  I have to be honest I was not that tired, and felt ready to run. 

A quick group chat phone call to Mum, Dad and Amie, and then down to the hotel restaurant for some breakfast. 

I had piece of toast, one banana and some Weetabix, which later I would regret.  

We were told by the tour company to be down at reception by 4:00 a.m. sharp, 7 of the 8 runners respected this request except one Indian guy who finally made it down by 4:15 a.m., this would now only give us 40 minutes to drop off our bags and go to starting pen as the gates close 15 minutes before the event starts.

 It was fair to say this bloke wasn’t on my Christmas Card list and added extra stress to the start of the day that no one needed when running nearly 90km.

If it was me driving, there was no way I would wait for him. In my opinion there was no excuse for this behaviour and this is typical of some people.

We finally made it to the city centre at 4:50 a.m. with heavy traffic and the other 20,600 runners trying to make their way to the start line.

 I decided to leave my bags on the bus and would later pick these up at the finish and this automatically lifted a lot of stress as I knew I didn’t now have to line up to drop my bags off.

20 minutes to spare and I am standing directly under the famous yellow Comrades Arch, always a very special feeling.

The atmosphere was electric with singing, dancing and a well-known YouTube blogger Man v Miles doing a video blog. I sat down straight away on the ground and struck up a conversation with a south African who also had the goal of sub 7 hours. 

It wasn’t long and the National Anthem started, I remember last year being so nervous as the longest I had run was 64 km, and I couldn’t stop shaking.

This year I was a lot calmer having run the 2023 event and a 100km under the belt.  

I was relieved that there weren’t any sound issues this year and we really got to experience the two songs Chariots of Fire and Shosholoza , if anyone has ever watched this on tv you will understand how moving this can be with 20,600 other runners.

The cockle crow sounded twice and shit was getting “real”

The gun fires and we are away.

The first 1500m is slightly down hill and straight away I am watching my pace and keep telling myself that there is 87 km to go, and that in its self is a daunting feeling.

I went through first km in 4:26, this didn’t feel hard, but understandably anyone would feel good under these circumstances and only running 18km in the week leading up to race day.

After the first 1500m you start climbing and this is relentless until the 46km mark in Drummond.

In saying that, for every up hill, there is a slight down hill where you can get a slight break before climbing again, but as I mentioned in previous blogs the down hills can be become just as hard as the up hills with all the jarring and pounding of the quads on the pavement.

I passed through 5.5 km with an average time of 4.46 per km.

The goal was to run on ‘feel’ and be in control.

The next part of course are no named hills which is scary in itself and from 6 km to about 20km you are steadily climbing, I went through this section in 4:50s pace and by this stage the sun was starting to coming up over the hills, and people could start to see what I was wearing more clearly and this when people started to shout out things like.

“Aussie”

“Go Australia”

“Aussie, Aussie, Aussie” – to which I would reply back, “oi, oi, oi “, this definitely felt less lonely and one of the reasons why I did this as I knew they loved to cheer on any Australian’s competing in this event. 

We were now at the 21km mark of the run and approaching the first of the big five hills, and this would be Fields Hill, they say that this hill is the litmus test for how the rest of your day will go.

  I settled into a nice pack and felt pretty strong up this hill before approaching Hillcrest, and this where there were thousands of spectators lining the course, I vividly remembered this part of the run during the down year because of some of beautiful houses and shady areas along the course and people cooking up sort of meats on the side of the road.   It was both relief and feeling of sickness lol.

I had amazingly found myself with the same runner I had run the first 60 odd km with last year and his name was Jochem, he ended up having an amazing day and ran 6hrs and 54 and broke 7 hours for the first time.

I tried to stick with Jochem and his training partner for 8km, but eventually had to let them go ahead as I was experiencing flat patches / intestinal issues.  My pace hadn’t dropped that much and I was still running sub-5-minute pace average going up Botha’s hill.  (35km to 40km)

The next part of the course from Botha’s to Drummond (40 to 47km) is undulating, but mostly downhill and you get a really good break, if your legs haven’t been smashed by the up hills.

I would love to say I felt great, but it was here that I knew that I run the first 40km too quickly and my quads were banged up more than I would have liked.  Then add in that I needed the toilet (poo), it was then I decided that pooing my pants was a better option than the way I was feeling, I got some relief from doing this before going into the 4th of 5 big hills, Inchanga. 

This hill is a monster and goes for 2.8km, before getting here I passed the wall of honour and Arthur’s seat, I took my hat off twice and nodded my head, once at my plaque and then grabbed a rose and placed in on Arthurs seat, and said

“Good morning, Arthur”,

The story goes that if you say this that your second half of the run will great and Arthur will be on your side and I needed all the help I could get.  Watch this video to see more about this Video | Facebook

I was now well and truly into the second part of the race and went past the big screen telly and could see who was leading the event, and it really shows you how amazing these front runners are.

After Inchanga you get a bit of break from the climbing and drop down 3 to 4km, during these parts, the side of road is littered with people who have just about anything you want, from hot foods, to power raid, ice, deep heat, lollies, I think you get the picture.  

I was now at the 50km mark and heading into ‘Harrisons Flat’, which I can tell is not flat, there is a lot unnamed hills that pop out of nowhere. 

My stomach would go through patches where I wouldn’t feel it and then it would start to build again. 

In the past Amie and I have had a saying when it gets hard

“Just keep moving forward”, and that is what I did.

The pace was still maintaining under 5s on the downhills and mid 5s for up hills.  During some of my first Ultra races I had cramped pretty badly, and I was still paranoid that this would happen again, and so was really conscious of taking on some muscle relaxant salt tablets, luckily for me, I didn’t have any issues and I put this down to taking these tablets along with putting water over myself at every opportunity.

Taking on water or any drinks was a really easy process, and I wish that other races would do this as well, when they give you water it is in small plastic bag and you just break it with your teeth and it is so simple and works a treat.  

Now events are very environmentally friendly I can’t see this taking off, but in terms of what is good for the runner maybe this should be taken into account first, and sure this would help with medical issues within events.

From 60 km to 65 km the pace start slow on average to over 5 minute per km pace and my stomach was really churned up, the scary thing was that I knew that I still had little and big Polly shorts to come at high 76km and 80 km.

It was then I decided that I really need to stop and defecate on the side of the road, by this point I was feeling defeated and most likely knew that my sub 7 was gone, but silver was still capable if I could keep my ‘shit’ together, Parden the pun lol.

I got the phone out, gave my mum and Amie a quick call, I think I did this for maybe a pep talk/ let them know what was going on with my stomach.

 I was walking for about 30 to 40 seconds at this stage, found myself a tree that a had little bit of privacy and just let it go, straight away I go some immediate relief and felt better. 

These km were the slowest of the race with a 6:24 and a 7:26, luckily, I knew that the course was a net down hill for the next 4 km after a few small climbs, during this period there were so much bargaining on, I wanted to stop so badly, but kept saying things like

“It is less than 2 hours running”

“You can’t go home without a silver medal at least”

Quads smashed, body tired, I kept grinding forward with these words on mind and I started to get back into rhythm where I was running low 5 average.

I had discussed with Tim several times, no matter how I felt at late 70s / 80 km that I would I run Polly Shorts, this is an infamous hill that climbs for 100m and it is worst imaginable hill at this part of the event, the leading runner who mounts this hill first has never lost the event, so it shows you the importance of this hill.

 I approached it pretty broken man, but knowing that I felt better than my 100km event in January where I was walking/ running.  At least I hadn’t stopped running.

 I asked the runner next to me;

“Is this polly shorts?”, to which he replied.

“It sure is let’s get after it”

With my head in the mental game, I kept striving forward as I knew once I mounted this hill it was a net down hill to the finish line. 

I managed to run the whole hill and I knew now that I would get a silver medal as I only had to run the last 6.6 km in close to 10-minute Ks, which is walking pace for most people.

I got to the top, and starting hearing more cheers for my Aussie top.  This was where I saw the first sign on a building that said Pietermaritzburg and that was an awesome feeling.

With the silver medal locked away I turned my attention to a sub 7 hours and 10 minutes.  I was doing all these calculations in my head.

 To be honest I was not thinking that straight and just forgot about all this and focused on running 4:50s pace which I managed to do. 

I ran up a few short hills and the climbing was done and made a sharp right-hand turn into the last street before finishing at Scottsville horse track. 

I had only 2 km to run and the watch ticked over to 7 hours,  but 7 hours and 10 minutes was still possible. 

With the adrenaline pumping and finish fast approaching I was able to pick up pace, it was then I started to see all the Toyota scrimmage and I knew from last years event and several YouTube videos that I watched that the finish was less than km to go. 

With the excitement of finishing, I picked up the pace even more and turned for the last the time onto the horse track. I sprinted as fast I could, and was automatically taken over by the emotion of the event and couldn’t hold back the tears, I was grateful for two things, these were that I had finished and was only the second Tasmanian to ever get a silver medal for both up and down runs, the first being Tim my coach.

My finish time was 7hr, 9 minutes and 43 seconds, this was good enough for the 4^th Australian home out of over 100 Australian’s taking part.

From the first timing split I went from 863^rd place to 431^st out of 21,000 runners.

Am I happy?

I would say I am content and excited to have another crack at both the up and down runs now that I have some times on the board for both versions of the event.

Looking at this event and other runners, it’s evident that you get better at the event the more times you run it and I hope this is case for me, too.

I am still learning what Ultra running is all about and I am sure I can go faster next time.

These last 5 weeks have been amazing, from meeting Comrades winners, training at altitude, and making new friendships. 

This is some of the best times of my life and I am grateful that I had this experience.

This Comrades journey is not over and I am looking forward to seeing what I can do in the 2025 and 2026 events.

I now know what I need to do and I will apply these learnings next year and beyond.

If you have read, commented or followed my journey.  Thank you and I hope you got something out of it as well.

Until next time, happy running.

LEAVING DULLSTROOM, TRUSTNG THE PROCESS AND GOAL TIMES

26 nights down in Dullstroom and 1 night to go before making the 3-hour car ride to O.R Tambo International airport, Johannesburg.   

I have booked a taxi courier service that will leave at 11:30 a.m. sharp before catching my flight at 4:00 p.m. tomorrow (Thursday the 6^th of June)

I can’t believe how quickly this time has gone the last month.

I have made so many friendships and connections since being here, from the ladies in the coffee shop, to the security guard and electrician staying at my accommodation and the friendly locals and stall holders who reside in the area.

It is fair to say these groups of people have made me feel so welcome from day 1, and they will be following my journey on the comrade’s app along with family and friends back home and that is really cool feeling.

The last week I have fully been in taper mode with only ‘single’ training days, a 16 km longer run, a small fartlek session along with a 5 km comfortably hard effort. 

On Wednesday I did a fartlek session with 1 x 2 km pick up and 1 x 3 km pick up, the plan would be to run 3:50s pace, and if I felt stressed at any point to back this off.   I ended up running 3:50s pace and 3:40s pace high for the 3km effort.  

In-between the fartlek and my comfortably hard 5 km effort, I just did easy recovery runs and had a day off. 

For the 5 km effort I wanted relatively flat surface which was is an impossible task in Dullstroom, but also makes this location the perfect training ground to train for Comrades.

There is park opposite my accommodation and these relative flat roads that are both gravel, dust and asphalt that go around it.

The only thing is you can maybe get 700 to 750m from each loop, which meant that I would need to do 6 u turns in this 5km alone.

As mentioned, the goal was to run ‘comfortably hard’, which means you are running off feel but not going 100 % pace. 

I ended up running 3:38 pace and 18-minute low 5km, it doesn’t sound that impressive, but you are altitude and you could possibility take 15 to 20 seconds off per km.   

Which would equate to sub-17-minute 5km, and this is much faster than I was running in Tasmania before leaving home.

 A nice confidence booster and I have to keep reminding myself that the goal is 90km not this distance.  

 The long run was on my usual route starting from town and dropping down to 1850m before turning and climbing back up to over 2,000m.  The instructions from Tim were just take this run incredibly easy and don’t kill yourself even if you feel good and save yourself for race day.   I ended up running 5:15s and climbed 250m of elevation.  I felt okay and it was nice feeling to think that the work was well untruly completed now with only runs of 12 km and less.

Yesterday I went for my final run with Team Nedbank which is littered with comrades gold medallists, and still pinching myself that these guys know my name and were even interested in what my goals were or to even run with me. This is memories that will live with me forever.  We ended up running 12km and the pace slowly got quicker each km.  It started off at 6s and dropped to low 5s, still not a crazy pace.  You can watch part of the run via this Facebook live link here. https://fb.watch/swesteUml8/

I ended up having today off and will do the same thing tomorrow with a day’s travel to get to Durban. 

I will then run easy 6 km on the Friday, do Umhlanga Parkrun on Saturday and line up for race day on Sunday morning at 5:30 a.m. (1:30 p.m., AEST)

On the Friday morning I will be going on Bus Tour that is hosted by Comrades King, Bruce Fordyce( 9 x champion) , the bus will go over the comrades route, even though I have run this in reverse, this still will be some amazing intel and will refresh my memory. 

Along the way will stop several times at some famous locations within the event, these include the Comrades Wall of Honour, Arthur’s Seat and Entembeni School for learners with disabilities

 During the race these school kids line up in their wheel chairs and put their hands out for high fives. It is very emotional and uplifting part of the race and you really try to make an effort to do this if you can.

I have been to some of these locations, but last year my name wasn’t engraved on Comrades Wall of Honour.

On Friday I will get my chance to see my name and number on the wall and am very excited to get a photo of me standing in front of this.

 I love how your name is potentially still there when you have died and your family and friends can visit this if they are ever in South Africa.

Okay the burning question?

“What is your goal Brian?”

This is such a loaded question and one that I am currently talking over with Tim.

The race plan is to essentially start easy, gently work the uphills and cruise down.

Even on the ‘up run’ the downhills are the danger and where could possibly damage your legs.

I aim to get in a good bus of solid runners, and the company will help with pacing, too.

If I want to move up a bus, the plan will to do this on uphill and slow reel this group in.  

After 20 km, I would look for a few women or even a pack, as they a brilliant with pacing and it won’t be erratic.

It’s so hard putting any goal times down on paper as I have never done this event, but here goes.  I have labelled them in goal A, B AND C.

Goal A – 6:30 to 6:45 (4:32s to 4:42s)

Goal B – Silver medal (sub 7:30 and 5:00s)

Goal C – to finish.

Early on Tim taught me to have goal A, B and C just in case your day is not panning out the way you had hoped.  Last year I achieved a silver medal and I would dearly love to do this again, and only be the second Tasmanian to achieve a silver medal in both up and down events along with Tim my coach.

I feel like my preparation is better than last year and I am fitter, in a perfect world It be would have been nice not to miss a big chuck of training because of injury in Feb and March, but I can stand on the start line and honesty tell myself I have sensibly done everything I could do in the time frame to be in the best possible shape.

 I feel like I am already 1 up with 4 weeks of altitude training.  What will be will be, I know not everyone is comfortably in sharing their goals, I am not alone in that either, but I am confident in my abilities and don’t think these goals are ridiculously out of my reach.

In saying all this, the number one goal is to enjoy this event, take in the 500,000 people on the course and know you are lucky to be in this position.

On the day I will be wearing an Aussie Top with Kangaroo’s and a South African wristband.  I want people to know where I am from and proud that I am Australian.

Until next time, Happy running.

YOU CAN’T GET ANY FITTER, BUT YOU F%$K IT UP

Today is the South African election day where South African’s select a new National Assembly as well as the provincial legislature in each of the nine provinces. 

It’s a public holiday and the café is a lot more busy than normal with people taking the opportunity to get out for the day.

I can’t believe I have now been here for 20 nights, and I only have 7 nights left before making my way from Dullstroom to Johannesburg via road and then onto Durben where the race starts on June 9^th.

All research suggests to come down from altitude 3 to 4 days before race day, I am leaving early Thursday to give myself plenty of time to travel the three-hour journey from Dullstroom to the Joburg.  It will drop from 2050m to 1600m altitude.   To be honest I don’t know how I will feel once I am sea level.  The highest I had been before this for a regular period has been 1680m at Falls Creek on 4 separate occasions.   

Comrades has 1800m of climbing from start to finish during the 90 km journey, and the highest point of the course is 700m at Drummond (half way) , my thinkings were If I can spend some extended time at altitude producing more red blood cells that climbing hills from sea level up to 700m max will be much easier and could possibly be a 10 minute if not more improvement at most on event day. 

Only time will tell if this will be the case, and I am excited to see if the training has worked/ paid off.

This week has gone so quickly, in the last blog I wrote about doing a fartlek session, as my coach Tim explains this is intervals for Ultra runners.  I ran 18km and did either 1 km, 2 km or 3 km pick-ups with the goal of keeping the heart rate data under 160 heart beats.  On the way out it was net down hill the first 9km, my heart rate was only 140s, I had to keep telling myself to slow down during the recoveries at low 4-minute k pace.

 I used every single hill I ran up as an opportunity to pick up the pace.   On the way back is where the real work in this session starts, these hills are not huge, but are relentless and they don’t stop, the heart rate was more like 150s to low 160s during the pick-ups. 

The last climb is the hardest of all and you can see all of the 1.5 km of the hill you go up, once you round this it’s all downhill into the town center of Dullstroom.   

I ended up running 4:15s pace with 320m of climbing, well under desired race pace and great confidence booster at altitude.

Over the last week I have started my taper, in terms of mileage it decreases over the next three weeks from 160km, 115km, 70km and only 30 to 40km race week. 

When I am training for a marathon, I do a two week taper as compared to three weeks for ultras.   I would love to say I am feeling good, but I am experiencing all taper stuff that goes on which include phantom pains, tiredness, thinking you are sick, the main thing is I need to remain calm and ‘trust the process’

On Sunday I ran my last long run, I started this at 2:30 p.m., and just took my time with this one as I am so close to race day and I don’t want to cook it up.

 As my coach says “you can’t get any fitter Brian, but you fuck it up”

With these words in mind, I didn’t really have a goal distance and I just ran to feel, I ended up running 25km, climbed 600m and was about 7 seconds per km faster than last Sunday.  ( Facebook VIDEO)

All in all, a really good result and some all-important extra elevation banked along with extra hill strength going into the taper.

While I have been here, I have tried to keep things as normal as possible with recovery and doing all the ‘one percenter’s, these include regular massage, plenty of sleep and good foods. 

I found a massage therapist in the middle of town and this has only cost me $45 per 45 minutes, I have seen her three times now and this has made a real difference to my calves which are copping a beating with the 1600m to 2,000m plus I am climbing every week.

For those who know me, you will know I am real fan of the KFC, the best thing about being here is that I haven’t been able to eat takeaway if I wanted to and I am forced to eat healthy options which can only be good for my training/ race day.

I’ll be honest, I am dying for some dirty bird post-race and I will go to visit one in Durben at the first opportunity.  I am lucky I have one opposite my hotel, lol.

This week is not a long blog and there isn’t a lot more than I can write.

In next weeks blog I will give you a bit of insight on my goal time for Comrades and my race plan going into the event.

Until next time, Happy running.

TRAINING, CREATING MEMORIES AND COFFEE

I can’t believe it’s been nearly two weeks since arriving in Dullstroom.

I am settling into a really good routine and getting to know some of the locals. They are starting to know my name and they know why I am here which is really nice, and they have been asking lots of questions about Australia.

My go to coffee place is called Seattle Coffee Co and it is only situated a short 200m walk from my accommodation (see pictured).

The ladies who work here are lovely and know what I order without even asking, I go here every morning and order a cafe late and a full English breakfast.

In the last blog I talked about catching up with Wayne Spies, for those who haven’t read my previous blogs, he is an Australian training in Dullstroom for comrades and boasts an impressive personal best of 5:42 from last year’s down run.

We ended up catching up for 2 hours, this was amazing, we talked about both our training, goals and races coming up. Wayne is so down to earth and incredibly friendly and gentle. It was really interesting hearing about how the Nedbank Team train, he couldn’t quite obviously tell me all their secrets as it’s a huge competition between the competing teams taking part in the Comrades Marathon and they compete for the fastest team which includes some money and a trophy.

Last Friday I did my second ‘tempo’ run up here, the plan would be to run 15km over an undulating course that had over 200m of elevation. To be honest I woke up feeling a bit flat, so pushed the session to the afternoon and only did recovery run in the morning. Before going out in the afternoon I had a coffee and small piece of apple pie which wasn’t the best idea.

The course I would run was a net downhill, before finishing with a net up hill. I started off well with 3:54,3:45, and 3:42 km pace and settled into 150 to 156 per beats per minute heart rate. The section was the first lot of hills, and I still was able to hold subs 4s before turning halfway, this is when I found out that having a coffee / apple pie so close to the session wasn’t the best idea.

My stomach was churned up and I felt like a needed a poo. I turned still feeling strong with the hardest part of the ‘tempo’ to go, these weren’t huge hills, just very undulating which breaks up your rhythm, but also perfect training for comrades. I made the decision to cut the session short and only run 13km because I needed the toilet so bad. I crossed the line in 3.58 pace.

The pleasing data for me was that this run had more elevation, I ran further, and my heart rate was lower as compared to Tuesday’s session.

Despite finishing early, I was happy with the result. The gap on the run was 3:52 pace and according to the Final Surge altitude calculator it was worth 3:39s on flat course.
On Sunday I had planned to do a 40 km longer run down a road called Kruisfontien Road, during this run I would drop down to 1600m elevation and climb back up to over 2,000m. I started the run pretty tired with over 120 odd km in the legs from 6 days before.

I took the first net downhill pretty easy; I had a few stops for water/ hydration and to take some photos. I had made the decision pretty early on I would only run 32km, this would mean I would turn at the local golf club called Highland Gate. I knew it was going to be hard going on the way back as some of the hills I descended down were big and long. I turned in 80 minutes and made my way back up these hills, by this time it was hottest part of the day ( 3 p.m.) and I really was just surviving, the heart rate had spiked to 150s going up some of these hills, I made up it most of the bigger hills before needing to stop for some hydration and drink. With some flat coke and tailwind onboard I rounded the last few hills before making my way back to town which is a net downhill the last 1500m.

The run ended up having 600m of elevation, I had banked this crucial last long run in my prep. I had known this had taken a bit out of me and would take the next three days to recover.

When I first arrived in Dullstroom, my easy recovery runs were sitting at 130s heartbeat, these are now down to 120s and under, suggesting my body is adapting well to altitude.
When meeting up with Wayne he discussed with me that his coach had said that I could do some easy runs with Nedbank team. These guys are the best of the best and are full of Comrades champions and multiple gold medalists (top ten finishes) and this was going to be an experience of a lifetime.

We met up yesterday for an easy 1-hour run. Wayne introduces me and standing in front of me is Tete Dijana and Edward Mothibi, both these runners have won the 2019, 2022 and 2023 comrades. I was like child in candy shop, and you couldn’t keep the smile off my face.

When I say slow, I am not lying, these guys had done a hard session in the morning and this run was all about recovery. We were running 6:40 to 50s km, you got to keep in mind they run 3:30s pace over 87km with just under 2,000m of elevation. It really was a great reminder if it is good enough for these great runners, then it is good enough for me.

We just kept this one constant pace, during this time they asked a few questions about my training, my life in Australia. You couldn’t meet more down to earth people. On the way back it was a tad different, we just slightly picked up the pace for about 15 to 20 seconds every 1 minute or so.
I asked; – “why are we doing this? “

The boys replied – “to run the soreness out the legs from the session this morning”
This was an amazing experience, and we are doing this again on Thursday. I took lots of photos and have the most amazing memory on video (see Everyday Lions Facebook page)

Today consisted of an easy 30-minute run and will be followed by 15 to 20 km fartlek run with some 2 km to 3km pickups faster than ‘tempo’ pace. These will make my tempo pace feel easier.

The last week I ran 156 km and climbed over 2400m, it has been one of the most amazing weeks of my running life and I don’t ever take this for granted.

Until next time, happy running.

ARRIVING IN DULLSTROOM, FIRST SESSION AND MEETING TWO TIME WINNER, TETE DEJINA ( 2022, 2023)