Knysna Half Marathon 2024
Did you hear about that ‘oyster’ joke?
I laughed so hard I almost pulled a mussel.
Many muscles are sore and stiff from yesterday’s race! But, I think most of us agree, that it was definitely worth it.
“You don’t have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.”
The Knysna Half Marathon was an intense but very pleasant and memorable experience. We stayed at Knysna Log-Inn Hotel which is walking distance from the finish line which was very convenient. There were a lot of runners staying there.
A taxi was organized to fetch us from our hotel at 5:15am on Saturday morning. The hotel made an early breakfast especially for the people doing the race. One could choose to have have toast, baked oats, muffins, yoghurt, bananas and coffee. It was early for my nervous stomach so I just ate a tablespoon of baked oats. For interests sake I wore a continuous glucose monitor to monitor my glucose levels during the race.
The taxi dropped us off at the taxi-drop-off point where all the 6500 runners meet. Many many local taxis take two hours to transport everyone to the starting point of the race, deep in the Knysna forest. The sun only came up behind a cloudy sky after 7am when we were already at the starting point. It was cold, but it sounds as if other years have been much colder. The full moon watched over us as we waited for the taxis to take us to the forest.
I didn’t realize this before the race, but the event is a charity run which aims to uplift the community. Almost every runner takes a blanket or jacket to donate to the local people. Just before the race starts, everyone throws their blankets and jackets on everyone else, well, they aim for the side of the road where people load the donated stuff onto a truck. Some people keep their jackets on a bit longer and give it to local people who cheer next to the route for the first 2km. The people were shouting “ma-ra-thon” in a supportive way and not begging.
It must have rained in the days before the race because there were a lot of muddy areas which could have been a slipping hazard. We ran on gravel road, on pine needles, on a mountain trail route, next to and under tall trees, through the forest, under a bridge, up stairs and, the last 2 km on the tar road next to the lagoon. It was very scenic. Imke and I walked when the uphills were tough and then ran again on the downhills. And then there was this downhill that people spoke about before the race…Simola Hill… I generally like downhills, but this downhill was a different story and quite the challenge! Look at the elevation map that my Garmin recorded:
I could have (and should have) trained a bit harder… but….I made it! I do think the ‘high altitude’ training was an advantage for me. It was nice doing it with my sister! We walked when we needed to and motivated each other to run. Now my legs are stiff and I am tired, but I feel fine and happy that we actually did it! You get 3 and a half hours to finish the race. I cant find our official times but my watch said Imke and I took 2 hours 50 minutes. I really wore my medal the whole weekend! We did it! We actually did it! 💪💪💪
The rest of our crew did well with very impressive finishing times. It was a bit weird that the organizers put big red “40+”, “50+”,”60+” signs on people’s numbers according to their age. I think they should make that age sign at least smaller than the race number for future races. 🤣🤔
Thank you to Imke for taking most of the photos!
