Date Held: 3 September 2017

Distances: 5km / 13km / 20km

Terrain: Trail running

Venue: Leeuwenkloof 

Website: My Road Less Travelled

Photos by: @TVrugtman / @AdventureLifeSA

Scrub Hare Trail Race was hands down one of my favourite races organised by My Road Less Travelled. It was filled with lots of challenging terrain and interesting twists and turns so intricate that we even got lost for a few seconds, but hey, that’s part of the adventure! There are allot of pictures in this post, but I just couldn’t decide on what to use! All of them are so good!

My Road less travelled aims to challenge runners to push boundaries whilst exploring untapped areas. Venues are chosen by the variety in terrain that you will experience from jeep tracks, single tracks to no tracks at all. They want Gauteng runners to get stronger to be able to compete on a higher level in other provinces.

The venue was really beautiful and all natural. This gave you the perfect feeling of running in the wild. It was a nice and hot day and summer was definitely dominating over spring. The race was filled with lots of trail running enthusiast and the atmosphere was really great and exhilarating.

We gathered together and Nina started to explain to us the route. There were to be water tables and marshals to guide the way.

As we started we all ran for about 700m outside the parking lot we encountered some loose sand and then we started to climb on a jeep track, this took us through beautiful grasslands and gave us refreshing wind to cool us down after the hill we climbed, greeted by beautiful views. We proceeded downhill to our first water point at about 2.5 km in, I skipped this water point and thought I would just catch up on the next one.

We were greeted with a single track and some forest, tree covered parts. Winding through and running through a river, this was actually very refreshing. Out we went and continued onto the next water point, here I had a few Jelly sweets and oranges, and this was a needed life saver as the hill that was about to meet us would be quite intense.

Small shavings of flake like rocks make you incline a little tricky, fast feet is the best answer here to prevent each step from sliding down after you touch down on the ground. However this is easier said than done as my legs started to burn as I made my way up up up. When you reach the top the views are again very beautiful and open, so you can see very far. You make your way back along the fence.

Errr.. here is where I got a little lost, so I kept going, and probably enjoyed the views so much that I missed a marker, when I got to the same point as where the first water point was, a few runners and I realised something was up.

Some of the other runners had nice navigating watches so we could easily try and make out way back. We back tracked and between losing concentration, not really running with purpose I hit my foot on a rock and bolted down so fast I couldn’t even push my hands out to break my fall.

Luckily I was picked up so fast on my left and right side by two ladies, it happened so fast when I got up I just wanted to keep running! Haha the ladies stopped me and told me to just check myself, very concerned to see if I was ok. I stopped and took a breath. At this point I was 9/10 weeks pregnant. So when I took a moment to stop I realized what happened I started to stress so much, I just prayed that everything would be ok. We found a route back and I pulled back running slowly, taking it easy.

Unfortunately I missed the main attraction of the race! The Cave!

It was the last part of the race and Nina describes it as follows on my road less travelled’s website –

“you will meet up with the 20km path to go onto the single track towards the cave. Please note the cave is dark and short sections are incredibly technical – it will be lit up but we advise you to walk until you see the light at the end of the tunnel”

We ended up on the road we started on and made our way back to the starting line/finish line. At this point my app said that I had run 15km I think, anyway there wasn’t allot of signal on the farm so I didn’t even bother with my Strava and just used my Ipod.

After the race we all had built up quite a good comradery between the few of us that got lost, it was allot of fun anyway and definitely worth it. We all got a little dirty but it was worth it and it was good fun! I would really recommend the races organised by Nina and the team from My Road Less Travelled. 

Since my fall I have decided to put the brakes on my trail running, but I can’t wait to get back and do all of these races again next year!

We stayed for the prize giving and I had a very well deserved Hot dog! The prizes were really good and allot of fun to take part in! There were prizes for the tallest runner, and the shortest, which gave everyone a good laugh.

There was something for everyone, the dirtiest runner, and the strongest in plank, free sports massage vouchers and more! There was even a Hot air balloon prize! When you enter for the raced on the website, be sure to answer the questions in the blog posts, you could stand a chance to win amazing prizes! They also have a fresh take on medals, which is just as special as the races.

Be sure to keep an eye out for more raced by My Road Less Travelled you will definitely not regret taking part in them!

The Scrub Hare Trail Run is part of the rock rabbit series. It is a series of 4 Races that are not to be missed:

(See below and click on names to follow through to the website)

1. Captain Carrot 
2. Nogwaja Run
3. Scrub Hare Run
4. Rock Rabbit

I only took part in the Scrub Hare Trail Run, but hope to do all of them next year if possible. Nina’s Races really are a fresh challenge and planned with the utmost efforts!

Hope to see the rest of you at the next race! Follow through to the website to see more races presented by My Road Less Travelled

Happy Running!

Jani

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