We went to Cape Town yesterday so that I could run in the Runners World 10km Trail Run at Kirstenbosch - a special for Valentine's Day, and the first one ever run there.
After dropping the animals off at the kennels, we drove to Kirstenbosch via the shops (of course). We don't see many shops so that is always a novelty. Driving through Somerset West on the way to Cape Town, after waiting for the traffic lights to turn green, a tiny car came and hooked itself up on our towbar! Excellent! 'The brakes failed!' the driver said! I wasn't surprised, looking at it. I'm surprised anything worked at all on it. Five smartly dressed black people got out of it, and a babe in arms that slept through the whole thing! Pity their vehicle wasn't as smart as them! I'm just grateful we have a towbar! Didn't do a lot for their car though - a write-off!
Anyway, we eventually got to Kirstenbosch later that afternoon after some 'very necessary after all that' shopping! It was fairly painless registering and we had a wander around until just before 6 o'clock when the race, sorry, run, was to start. I got changed and then started panicking in case it was too hard! Well, it was up the side of the mountain, and the run had been described as having 'some steep hills and descents'!
It did have some steep hills and descents. Steps that seemed to go on forever upwards, but the most beautiful scenery once we got up there, and then steps that came all the way back down again. Then another lot of steps upwards and steep gravel hills down again. Yes, it was very hard work, but I did feel that I have been getting stronger and my legs worked better than they would have done a few months ago.
It really was a very slow course because a lot of it was single file trail and we all had to follow whoever was at the front, walking. I found the worst part was the long downward run. It was very steep and was all loose gravel. I am absolutely useless at running down any sort of hill because I can't control how fast I go, so I ended up walking down those parts slowly. But.. I wasn't the only one who did that! At least I kept going up the steep steps on the way up the mountain. One guy had to stop - twice!
It was supposed to have been about 10km long, but ended up being about 7.6kms (according to my Garmin) and the organisers apologised afterwards because they had had to change the course at the last minute, due to Kirstenbosch telling them just before the start that they couldn't run in one particular area (even though it had all been organised well before the event), and one of the marshalls decided to 'go home' and throw the direction signs in the bush. Very helpful. So some people got lost as well. But, other than this(!) it was very enjoyable and was a lovely evening to do it, finished off with a picnic.
I ended up doing about 7.6km in 1hr 14mins(!). I have no idea how they are going to work out everyone's results as not everyone ended up going the same way!
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