Knysna Marathon 2026

“Just take it run day at a time.”

My calves, hamstrings and lower back are definitely reminding me that I ran 21 km yesterday. But while my body feels stiff, my mind feels inspired.

There is something about doing physically difficult things that mends one’s mental wellbeing.

The last 3 km were tough. I was tired. Really tired. I just kept repeating to myself, “Almost there. Almost there.”

I met Stacey while we all waited for the taxis to pick us up. We discovered we were a good pace match and ended up running most of the race together. Marcus was also somewhere between running ahead of us and dropping back.

Imke, Ruchenda and Clive had an impressive run, finishing in 2 hours and 6 minutes. Marcus and I finished in 2 hours and 40 minutes. The official results are a little confusing because the race time starts with the starting gun, not when you actually cross the starting line. We were almost at the very back of the massive crowd of runners, and it took us about 15 minutes just to reach the start, which was about half a kilometre away.

The scale of the event was amazing. There were around 1,250 entries for the marathon and about 6,500 for the half marathon. The energy of thousands of runners before sunrise is quite a vibe.

This was our second Knysna Half Marathon. Here is the post for our 2024 run.

Once again we stayed at Knysna Log Inn which is an awesome place to stay when doing the race because they organize shuttles to the start, give runners breakfast before the race and the race ends within less than a kilometer from the hotel.

The day started early with coffee and a muffin and then a shuttle (local taxi) took us from the hotel at 5:30 am to the taxi pickup point.

Then we waited in a very long queue before another taxi finally took us to the starting point around 7 am. Once there, people stood in line for Toilet Town (or just went in the bush.)  Its quite a story to have enough toilet facilities for 7000+ runners!

I do think the event is uplifting for the local community because every runner brings at least one item to donate. I went in my onesie and put it in the donation truck just before the start of the race.  Imke had a warm fluffy poncho which looked so comfy, I wished she had donated it to me instead.  Some local community members stand next to the road and shout: “Ma-ra-ton, ma-ra-ton!”  Something I didn’t like was that a few local people came into the crowd with bags, asking for donations and then went and filled their own black bags from the donation truck…. Which actually hands out the clothes and blankets at the local church…maybe the organizers could look into that for next year.

Was it worth the sore muscles?

Absolutely.  It was such a memorable weekend and feels like I achieved something.

Running reminds me that we are capable of more than we think. Most of the limits we experience are not in our legs. They are in our minds. And every now and then it is good to do something that reminds you, “I can do hard things.”