I wrote this article for the now no-longer TrailBlazing – it looks at the evolution of trail running in South Africa, from past to present, and what’s ahead.
Trail running is older than the hills, but in the last 10 years has burst into growth around the world. Linda Doke looks at what has shaped that evolution in South Africa.
Over the past decade trail has taken the running world by storm. Since 2006, trail running has sprinted at pace across Europe, the US, Australia and Asia, and the international racing calendar is packed with events in every far-flung region of the globe.
Fuelled by the fascination around gruelling international endurance runs that have entrenched themselves as benchmarks in the global trail icon category, such as the Western States 100 (now in its 44th year), the Leadville Trail 100 (35th year) and the Marathon des Sables (32nd year), interest in trail running in South Africa was gradually taken up during the late 1980s with a few races here and there around the country.
Further fired by the global social media frenzy, the pace picked up from gentle trot to what can best be likened to an FKT. (For those new to the sport, FKT is the hottest term in trail: Fastest Known Time.)
Today South Africa’s trail running calendar is jam-packed with events of every distance: short, long, ultra, multi-day and even non-stop endurance events.
Let’s take a step back…
Anyone who thinks trail running is a new sport to South Africa has been gravely misled. It has been around for decades. We have our own rich heritage of classic trail races to be proud of. The oldest by far is the Harrismith Mountain Race, a 15km race on the Platberg (‘flat mountain’) overlooking Harrismith in the Free State. With the first formal staging of the race in 1922, this year will see the 95th running of the race, making it even older than the Comrades Marathon, which is in its 92nd year.
Other races with deep roots in South Africa’s trail history are the Rhodes Run (now in its 29th year) (52km), the Mont-aux-Sources Challenge (23rd year) (50km), the PUFfeR (23rd year) (80km), Three Peaks Challenge (21st year) (50km), Skyrun (21st year) (100km), and the 7-day self-sufficient desert race, the Kalahari Augrabies Extreme Marathon (18th year) (250km).
How it sped up
Gradually trail races started popping up around the country. The Hout Bay Trail Challenge (2002, 36km) and the Old Fisherman’s Trail Challenge (2004, 21km) were tough, shorter distance races that put Hout Bay on the trail running race map, but still the sport was very much under the radar.
Then in 2007 everything changed. Kevin Vermaak, founder of the then-already world-renowned Cape Epic mountain bike race, introduced the trail running version: the Cape Odyssey. Modelled on the same multi-day principle as the MTB event, the Cape Odyssey was a five-day stage race that had 100 runners teamed in pairs traversing 211km from the Southern Cape coast to the Cape Winelands. Vermaak promised an event that would match the quality of the best offered on the international trail running scene, and he delivered. The race was a huge success, and it sparked the interest of trail runners not only across South Africa but overseas.
The following year, the race was staged again – this time with a slighter easier route and attracting double the number of entrants. Despite there never being a third staging of the Cape Odyssey (apparently due to the expense of organising the event), the race had played a major part in hauling South African trail from behind the rocks it had been hiding. The trail flame in South Africa had truly ignited.
In 2008 the second catalyst to the growth of the sport in this country saw the introduction of the Trail Series® organised by Wildrunner, consisting of five short (5-7km) and long (10-16km) races over five weeks, a summer and winter series in both the Western Cape and Gauteng. Offering very doable distances, and hosted in green belts, through urban national parks and on private farms within easy driving distance of Cape Town (or Johannesburg and Pretoria for the Gauteng series), the Trail Series® made trail accessible to the average runner, shifting the perception of trail being an out-there sport that could only be taken up the rebel road runner or the foolhardy. The series catered for all, from the novice needing to get a feel for off-road, to the experienced speedster nimble on technical singletrack.
In the nine years since inception, its growth curve has been gobsmacking – from 250 entrants at the first race in the Cape Summer Trail Series® in 2008, to a sold-out field of 1 400 runners per event in 2017.
At the same time, excitement around trail running was igniting internationally. Event companies sprang up, offering events that were more than simply races, they were challenges, and there was something for everyone.
For the intrepid rough-traveller type, there was the Marathon des Sables, the first of the self-sufficient multi-day desert races. This was soon followed by the 4 Deserts Race Series of 250km, seven-day self-sufficient stage races set in extreme conditions in isolated corners of the globe like the Gobi Desert in China, the Atacama Desert in Chile, the Sahara Desert in Egypt, and Antarctica.
For the endurance nutter, there was a mushrooming of ultras to choose from, taking runners across mountain ranges, over glaciers and vast tracts of ice, through deepest jungle, in all weather conditions and on all terrain.
For the adrenalin junkie, there was skyrunning, a specific type of trail running that focused on pure mountain running, where elevation and running at altitude was the primary challenge.
Social media spurred the growth, and international names like Kilian Jornet, Lizzy Hawker, Dean Karnazes and Scott Jurek became synonymous with the sport, achieving remarkable trail feats that people hadn’t thought possible.
Importantly, from 2008 South Africans had their own international hero in Capetonian Ryan Sandes, whose modest demeanour and considerable natural talent took him from zero to hero status as he burst onto the world trail running scene, seemingly out of nowhere, to win trail ultras on the global stage. In Ryan, South Africans had someone they could relate to – he was local, he was a genuine ‘nice guy’, and his story to greatness inspired thousands to, in Ryan’s words, “follow their dream”.
Going forward
Today the trail running offering in South Africa is plentiful. Not only have many national parks around the country opened their tightly protected hiking routes to trail races, including the internationally applauded Otter African Trail Run, the Whale of Trail and the Marloth Mountain Challenge, but the types of races that until recently South Africans could only find overseas are now accessible locally.
Skyrunning, for example, is now in its third year of its annual South African Skyrunner® Series, fully sanctioned by the International Skyrunning Federation, and one of 63 nations hosting races on the international skyrunning calendar.
The Ultra-Trail Cape Town 100km, now in its fourth year, has been included in the World Ultra-Trail Circuit, ranking it in the calibre of many of the world’s greatest trail ultras, including Grand Raid de Réunion, Transgrancanaria, Western States 100, Ultra Trail de Mont Blanc and 16 other global greats of the trail world.
Over the past decade our top trail running men and women have raced and podiumed on the international stage, and in turn hundreds of international athletes are flocking to South Africa, and southern Africa, to experience the beauty of our trails.
There’s no doubt the future of trail running in our country will continue to flourish, given the energy and enthusiasm of the people at its heart.
2 Comments
Lerene
on 29th September 2017 at 6:27 pm
Hi, I saw your recipes on facebook today, and immediately made the peanutbutter balls, doing otter training tomorrow, so I will test them out! What a beautifull website! Good luck Lerene
race in 1922, this year will see the 95th running of the race, making it even older than the Comrades Marathon, which is in its 92nd year.
Hi, I saw your recipes on facebook today, and immediately made the peanutbutter balls, doing otter training tomorrow, so I will test them out! What a beautifull website! Good luck Lerene
Great, Lerene, they’re the bomb! Let me know what you think!