Comrades Marathon Blog

This is the first in a series of posts, recapping some of my races from last year.

At school I competed in many cross country and track events, but I never ran an official road race. I had attended several races, with my father having completed the Two Oceans 56km twice. Therefore it’s strange to think that my first race was only in April 2006, the Merrilyn Smith Memorial. I was roped into running it by my friend Joey (he’s honeymoon at the moment, so by the time he reads this he won’t be able to correct me )

The race is staged one week before the Two Oceans, so it’s quite popular amongst runners gearing down on their tempo. The route goes through the leafy suburb of Rondebosch and starts at the UCT law faculty, not far from the finish of the Two Oceans.

My fitness wasn’t great at the time, although I was active. Torturing myself on those terrible indoor bikes was a regular occurrence. I remember standing at the start of the race, my heart pounding, and frantically trying to think of a goal time for myself. I mentioned to Joey that a sub 50 minute time would be great, but in truth, all I wanted to was to finish the race without stopping. The race went by quickly and I don’t remember much from it, but I really felt good when I finished in 46:15, in a credible position of 46:15. That’s when the bug bit, I was hooked.

Looking at my stats of the race, I realise how unfit I was. At the peak of my fitness last year, a pace of 4:38 min / km would result in an average HR of about 150. During that race however, my average HR was 168. A clear indication of how hard I was working to keep that pace.

I can’t complain though, it was a great race, and it can take the credit for getting me into running.