Hi everyone
It was a busy weekend! Saturday was the Two Oceans 56km Ultra Marathon - I was quite nervous about it - its a deceptively hard run - quite flat for the first 28km, 2km of climbing Chapman's Peak (which was opened especially for the race), a quad burning section down the otherside, and then the real race starts when you hit the bottom in Hout Bay and start the climb the eventually leads up to Constantia Nek and then the last 10km of camber that takes you back to the finish at the University of Cape Town.
Carla was kind enough to use her first Saturday morning off from IronMan to get up at 4:30 drive us to the start in Dean Street where we met Chris and Linda and waited for the Half Marathon to get underway (I think there were about 13000 entrants for the Half) before we went down to the Main Road to enter our starting pens.
I think our race had about 7000 runners.
Rob & I were seeded in B group, we met Lisa there and chatted nervously while we waited for the countdown and the eventual start.
I always find the start a bit of a fight - you have to look for open gaps while trying to lock in your race pace as soon as possible. I must admit, we found it quite easily - inspite of slight technical difficulties with our watches - Rob initially reset his by accident and mine stopped after 30 minutes, so we never really had our full racing time, just splits per kilometer. Once we locked in our pace, we were actually quite disciplined about it and pretty much kept almost the exact splits for every kilometer except about five or six splits during the climbs.
Running into Hout Bay was a special treat for me - first time in Hout Bay Harriers kit and the supporters were pretty awesome I must admit.
We knew that the real race started once you hit the bottom of Chapmans but we worked well together in tackling the climb, and I think the mountain training really came in handy here.
For myself I broke it up into running from the bottom to the second circle by the Police Station, then from there to the Harrier group waiting mid way up the climb - I must admit, I was so into the run, that I really don't think I noticed everyone there, but thanks Carla the support was great - I think Carla may have been expecting me to get there in full Prince Of Darkness mode, but for the first time in a long, long time I was really having fun, and completely in the mood to race.
From the Harriers, the next section was the final and steepest section to the top.
We got there pretty much unscathed, and then tried hard to do the Math to try and figure out what time we were at. We knew as much that we most likely went through the marathon mark in a record time for both of us, but the end time was still a bit of a mystery. The first time I actually had an inkling of my finish time was when we got onto the field, and I saw the clock. For those of you that know, the finish at Two Oceans has got to be the longest finish of ANY race - that field is LOOOOONG.
We pretty much got in at 4:34 - it was cool to cross the line together!

Huge big thanks to Rob for the GREAT run - couldn't have done it without you bud!
(Next we look for yellow footprints in the desert ha ha)
And huge thanks to Carla for getting us there, and getting back in time to the finish to pick us up - the roads are closed, so to get back to UCT in time, you really need to haul ass!

Sunday was a gentle, slightly stiff and very slow stroll through the Constantia green belt, more a loosener than anything else. It also marks the beginning of 5 weeks until race day!!!

I am pretty pleased, I raced in my new Linebreak compression shorts, and I think it had a lot to do with the fact that I didn't cramp, its a weird feeling of your shorts kinds of holding everything together.
I spent the rest of Saturday in my spare set of tights, just for recovery!
Besides a little case of hayfever, I think I came out of the weekend okay.
Well okay for the Prince Of Darkness that is.