Wow, what a perfect morning for a run it was yesterday!! Overcast and cool, hardly a breeze, very little traffic.
Charlene, Dy and her friend Kerryn, and I, all set off from Parow just after 5am on Sunday morning, all in good spirits and looking forward to a relaxing run and some fresh air. Dy was tackling her first 30km.
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| Route Profile |
We started out at quite a quick pace, with Kerryn leading the group, lots of spring in her step. The rest of us followed but at a slightly more reserved gait - there was a long road ahead of us and we wanted to save some energy for the hills ahead. It was great watching Kerryn skip and float - she was clearly enjoying herself, and isn't that what running is all about: having fun?!?!
Anyway, we were off, heading down Plattekloof Road, enjoying the flattish 'warm-up' stretch. The first couple of kays were fairly uneventful - we were finding our rythm, stretching our legs and having good conversation. We started noticing the slight gradient increase from Richwood, and slowed our sub-6m00 pace a little to prevent an early burn-out. By now we'd left Parow, Plattekloof and Richwood far behind and the rolling hills of the Durbanville Wine Route lay ahead of us.
Overcast as it was, I was getting quite hot by this point, there being no wind to cool us off. But I was so grateful for the cloudy conditions!! The weatherman had promised a hot day ahead, and I wanted to be home by the time the sun started beating down.
By the time we were passing km #12, we were feeling the gradual but steady incline. At least the Hillcrest olive farm was just ahead, somewhere around the 13km mark. The hill wouldn't last forever, and we managed to keep moving. Finally at around 13km we saw the white wall of the olive farm, and knew that our first break was just ahead. I was running with Kerryn at this point, with Dy and Charlene not far behind. Kerryn sped ahead to the water point while I was happy just to keep running at this point.
We regrouped around the tap, filled our bottles and splashed water on our faces to cool off. The mist was so thick over here that we couldn't see the top of 'Big Mama' hill looming ahea - all we could see was an incline disappearing around the corner and into the pea-soup mist. Some of us knew what was ahead, having run this route before, but others were here for the first time. I cautioned the others to take it slow and easy and beware of the false top: not so much an issue in the mist, but on a clear day you think you can see the top of the hill and plan accordingly, only to find at the 'top' that there is still some climb left.
So up 'Big Mama' we went, Dy and I taking the lead, Charlene and Kerryn hot on our tail. We took it slow but steady, and before we knew it we were at the 'top' sign near Ntida. After all that climbing, the downhill ahead of us felt fantastic!! Legs still strong, spirits high, we floated down past Bloemendal, towards Tygervalley area.
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| Route Map |
At the robots we stopped to regroup, then set of on the slightly undulate drop towards Kenridge, passing a couple of runners heading up in the opposite direction. We spotted 2 sites of leftovers from what appears to have been quite serious car accidents - loads of glass and bumper fragments and who knows what all else. Kerryn spotted 2 wooden crosses on the right-hand side of the road and went to have a closer look, while the rest of us continued on towards the Kenridge BP, eager for a break.
Refreshed and once again regrouped, we set off to tackle the next hill - 'Oops': first sister of 'Big Mama'. 'Oops' officially runs from the bottom of Jipp de Jager until the top at the Golf Course, but Van Riebeekshof Road is also a bit of a climb, a bit of a pre-Oops warm-up.
Not quite a km later we noticed the gradient evening out - 'Oops' conquered! There was still a little post-'Oops' ahead from the Golf course to the Engen, where we stopped to regroup once again, fill our water bottles, and re-energise on some ice cold Coca Cola.
Then it was off once again, to tackle the next sister: 'Ouch'. Ouch indeed - she's not very long or steep, but following so soon after 'Oops' she's quite a sting in the tail (or in our case, our abused hamstrings!) But slow and steady wins the race (or conquers the hill), and we were soon cresting 'Ouch' and looking forward to a long descent towards Hendrik Verwoerd Drive.
Refreshed from the downhill, we mentally prepared ourselves for the last sister: 'Eina'. As with the previous 2 sisters, 'Eina' isn't particularly long or steep, her biggest weapon is her location - 25km into the run, after 3 tough hills, she deserves her name!! But the key to conquering any hill is to know your enemy (or as my friend Paul would say: "The hills are your friends") and chew the elephant one bite at a time. So we step by step we made our way up 'Eina'. First get past the church. Now past Eksteen Road robots (which thankfully played along with us). So far so good, now to get past the Protea Hotel intersection. Great! Now admire the view and slight break in gradient before tackling the last stretch along Lover's Lane to the Hannes Louw Road intersecion.
*phew* climbing done! 'Big Mama' and her 3 sisters have been conquered yet again. The reward: a long downhill cruise before reaching McIntyre Road, De Grendel in sight, our cars just ahead.
Seeing our cars still safe in the parking lot, we were still just shy of 29km, so we headed off down De Grendel towards the traffic circle, left towards the atletics track (but not quite insane enough for a 'victory lap' around the track) and back around the circle before finally heading into the parking lot to finish our morning run.
Kerryn was waiting for us when we eventually finished our run (she'd been struggling with painful hip flexors for more than half of the run, so she headed straight for the finish line and a good stretch while we clocked up a few hundred meters extra, to bring our mileage total up to 29.4km. Close enough to the 30km goal, without overdoing things and still keeping the run fun.
Huge well done to Dy for completing her first 30km run!! She ran strong all the way, and pulled the rest of us up the hills. She even had enough energy left to run the final 3km at 6m00 per kay and just under, and rev up to 5m30 pace for the last 500m!! Fantastic!!! You'll breeze your first official 30km race Dy!! Well done and thank you also to Charlene and Kerryn for your great company the whole way! I hope you guys enjoyed the run as much as I did??
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Here's a suggestion for next week Tuesday's regular mid-week Hillbilly run (28th December, 05:00): http://bit.ly/gDaUfe - kind of the Two Oceans Half Marathon route but with a few minor Hillbilly twists, and about 18-19km in total, including a scenic detour through Kirstenbosch Gardens (Google Maps unfortunately does not have record of Kirstenbosch internal paths and walkways so I can't plot that bit of detail):
We'll start at Great Westerford and head down Main Road towards Wynberg. We follow the Two Oceans Half route pretty until we reach Kirstenbosch Top Gate, where we enter the Gardens (water at the Gardens entrance) and wind our way down to the Tea Garden entrance (more water if needed). From there we follow Kirstenbosch Drive to Bishopscourt Drive, cross the M3 into Struben, follow Bowood to Eden to Protea to Kildare and finally back to Dean Street. Not many water points along this route, so please bring a small water bottle along. Friends welcome too! It's holiday time for many people by then, so hopefully we'll see some new faces join us next week? Feel free to call or email me if you'd like details of next week's runs, or just pitch up on the morning and join us.
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Dean Street Hillbillies
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