We left early on Thursday morning, on our way to the “thriving metropolis” of Graskop. The road trip wasn’t too bad, Meg driving, Craig watching DVD’s, Pete studying and myself, playing play station. We arrived in the tiny town of Graskop around 14:30. We found our accommodation and managed to settle in just before the miserable weather set in.
The next morning was cold and wet, and so we decided to hit the pancake house for some breakfast and some hot coffee!!! We then took a tour around the minute town, walking in and about all the curio shops that are placed every where among the town. Later Craig, Pete and I went for a ride to Pilgrim’s Rest, a small town/village some 30 odd km’s away. The weather up the climb of the pass was really snotty, the rain was drizzling the whole time, we then crested the climb and had what felt like a 10km dry run almost the entire way down, it was really awesome!!!
Our day ended with us attending another pancake house just across the road from the other one (This was the 2nd pancake house out of the 4 we knew about).
On Saturday came the race, we were up reasonably early, with the marathon off at 8am and my race (35km half marathon) off at 8:20 am. I warmed up with Craig and the guys, and then went to the seeding area, after the marathon had gone we lined up, I was on the front row, I sat nervously on the start. We started on time and had a very long neutral zone, but after the lead car pulled off the racing started.
After a km or so there was a group of 7, Bryce Munro was setting the pace, myself, Jac-Johann Steyn and Arno du Toit sat at the back and in the middle of the pack, trying not to use too much of our energy too early in the race. Soon Bryce, myself and another guy were all together, but at the top of the ‘King of the Mountains’ I couldn’t hold on and I began riding with Arno and Jac, who were working very well together and closed up to me. From here on the three of us worked very well together and about 10km from the finish I started attacking, as I knew both Jac and Arnot both had a better sprint than me.
I got away but they worked together and closed up every time. A couple of kilometers down the road, one of the slower marathon riders that we were passing fell in front of us and I got caught up in the fall while Jac and Arnot seemed to come away relatively unscathed and they saw the opportunity and took off, leaving me to play catch up.
I chased really hard for about 3 km’s and managed to catch both of them again after putting in a really big effort. With about 3km to go they put another attack leaving me to try and chase them down again after having just played catch up and could feel the body starting to talk back and was really feeling the pace, but I still pushed myself to the limit, as we crested into the finish holding as long as I could but was still beaten to the line by a second or two.
I was really happy with my result, being my first major half marathon, against a field of seasoned competitors who have been doing this for a while.
The organization gone into this event was really awesome, the course was really cool but hard.
I would just like to say thanks to Craig, Meg and Pete. You guys are awesome. Thanks for the great weekend!!!
Lastly a big thank you to Dellah Paul, who also made it possible for me to attend.
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