RAC Looooong Run

I did it!! 

60km!! 

My longest distance to date!

Alan fetched me at 3.45am for early arrival, parking and entry at Old Parks.  A few words (that I couldn’t hear) by Vreni and at 5am we were off.  I tried to take a picture at the start, only to get a ‘memory card write protected’ error which I couldn’t sort out.  I also saw Johann from RunTallWalkTall at the start, but didn’t get to chat to him or run with him.

The first hour was in the dark and just a little difficult, going down unfamiliar roads without marshalls and no lighting.  I was really excited to travel thru’ so many suburbs in Joburg and see how they are connected – I’m so used to getting on the freeway that I had no idea how to get thru’ the suburbs.

I happily ran on my own, chatting to a few familiar people, getting a few funny looks because I was running in sandals.  In fact, at one water point, a lady whispered to another lady “look at her shoes” and she bent down to peer at my feet from under the table.  At another table a lady said to another “Here comes that girl I told you about in the sandals”. My husband was helping her at that table and he promptly said “That’s my wife” and she kept quite until I had moved thru’ and then she chatted to him about my sandals.

My husband was at the last 8 water points, giving me Coke and ice and causing me to sit in the boot and chat and rest and refuel.  I really took it easy, had fun and enjoyed the experience.  My right leg got very sore at about 35km, I used a variety of rubs, used The Stick but still couldn’t run down the hills.  I did really well going up the hills but lost a lot of time by walking down.  I still had about 15km to go when my dad called me – he was finished the run and in his car ready to go home.  He just wanted to check that my husband was en-route with me.  10km later I called him to see if he had walked up the last big hill and he had bathed and was lying on his bed resting already.

My overall time (7:25 hours moving time, 8:15 total time) wasn’t very important, the intention was to cover the distance and have lots of time on my legs. 

Objective achieved!! 

Bring on Comrades!!

And I got the T-shirt!!