After a quiet two weeks, a busy second half of the year awaits (Comrades runners who are resting are starting to get itchy feet I see, but just one more week and then the fun begins). Last weekend Sven Musica ran the 53km Dolomiti Extreme Trail in the Alps in Italy and had an amazing experience running in the snow. Sven finished in the top 10% of the field as well! He will be running the Num Num in August and the Lesotho Skymarathon end of November. Graeme McCallum is running the SA trail champs at the 38km Merrell Outeniqua Traverse tomorrow. Graeme is superfit and we can expect a great run from him in the masters category. Megan Mackenzie has had a huge disappointment in missing the SA champs tomorrow after her amazing race at the Mnweni Marathon where she broke the mens record and finished 4th overall and was 1st lady. But sadly the hard fall she had on the race resulted in a knee injury, and an MRI scan last week showed she has a 2cm bone bruise. Another week of rest and Megan will be back into full training. But Megan will be in the support team at the SA champs tomorrow, cheering on the other runners. Megan will also be doing a photo shoot this weekend for the cover of the next Trail magazine so watch out for it and the feature on her. Ryno Griesel who broke the Drakensberg Traverse record with Ryan Sandes earlier this year was on the cover of the latest Trail magazine with a great feature on him, so make sure you get it! He offers some really interesting insights and I enjoyed his take on why he runs trails. He will be flying to the USA next week to second Ryan Sandes on the Western States 100 miler trail. Closer to home, Ill be joining Elsali Gehm, Karine Bezuidenhout, Mariette Swanepoel and Sane Louw at the 2-day Rhino Trail at Mabalingwe this weekend. Its going to be huge fun, although I think the camping is going to be chilly so Ive packed a bottle of port. Its the first stage race and longest run for Karine, Mariette and Sane so theyre excited and nervous. On Sunday Darren Smith, Leslie Attwell and Naclanche Steyn will be running the Highveld Trail series while Rob Enslin starts the 3-day Kalahari mountain bike race in Botswana today. Later this year Ann Ashworth will be going for a sub 3hr at the Brussels marathon, Ethel Zulu will be running the Cape Town Marathon and New York Marathon, while Elsali Gehm and Sane Louw will be running the Berlin Marathon. And on the extreme side, Henk Moen will be running a 6-day race in August! Henk ran a 6-day race two years ago which he won with a distance of 600km, and we believe he can improve substantially on this. On the opposite end of the spectrum Greg Barnes will be doing fast 10km running to get back to a 31min time after running 33.03 just before the Comrades, while 52yr-old Judy Bird will be doing the Spar Ladies series. Judys record of 19.18 at the Modderfontein 5km Park Run still stands, any challengers? Talita Uys will be working on her 10km and 21km speed after having done her second Comrades, so watch this space! Last year Talita improved her marathon time at the Kaapsehoop marathon by 30min! On the trails Megan will possibly be doing the World Trail Champs in the USA in August after having won two qualifiers (Forest Run and Mnweni Marathon). She will also run the Otter (was 4th last year), and Lesotho Skymarathon. Graeme McCallum will do the Otter as well as the 100km Salomon Skymarathon, while Ryno Griesel will do the 100km Salomon Skymarathon. A number of runners will be doing the Lesotho Skymarathon (I ran it last year and it is a stunning 50km race with huge climbs), such as Cath McGown, Sven Musica, Rachel Manyathi, Rob Enslin and Jonathan Niemann. Nina Furness will be doing the Bastille as well as the 4-day NamaquaQuest, while Mariette Swanepoel will be doing the 4-day NamaquaQuest. Darren Smith will be tackling the Retto (Otter) which will be by far the furtherest he has ever run, so hes excited! Karine Bezuidenhout will do the 35km Magaliesberg challenge and we’re still planning races for her. Karine is improving fast on the trails! Rob Enslin will be doing the 52km Rhodes next month, as well as the Lesotho Skymarathon Jason Gradwell will be doing the 100km Hobbit trail in October Leslie Attwell will be doing the Num Num, Retto and Soaring Eagle Jonathan Niemann will be doing the Num Num and the Lesotho Skymarathon Ross Taggert will be doing the extremely tough 160km trail race in Reunion Naclanche Steyn is new to trails so we will be picking some nice races for her:-) John Black will be doing a mix of trails and roads, with another Comrades safely under his belt and we’ll still plan his races.
Posted on: Fri, 13 Jun 2014 09:41:50 +0000
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