Bruce Fordyce’s Comrades tales: To have your cake and eat it

It’s such a pity that South Africa’s two premier ultramarathons are run just a few weeks apart.

It’s like those poor people whose birthday fall on Christmas day or New Year’s day (my sister is one of those unfortunates). It’s simply too much excitement in too short a time and Comrades marathon runners are compelled to choose.

One of the events must take precedence. If their goal is to run a successful Comrades they must make Two Oceans the supporting act for Comrades. Two Oceans ambitions must be cast aside and the main focus has to be the Comrades marathon.

For Two Oceans fans it means discarding the Comrades. It’s a little like choosing the Rolling Stones as the supporting act for The Beatles. Neither should be the supporting act for the other. It’s interesting that many Cape-based runners call closed season after they’ve earned their Two Oceans medals. For many of them the Comrades is a bridge too far.

Recovery

As you read this, over 11,000 Two Oceans runners are busy battling up the mighty Chapman’s Peak, the race leaders are probably already summitting Constantia Nek.

The dilemma for many of those running on Saturday is that in an ideal world it should be possible to race both famous races. But unfortunately it’s not possible, or shouldn’t be attempted (of course the double has been successfully achieved by Gerda Steyn, Caroline Wostmann, Frith van der Merwe and Derek Preiss to mention a few exceptions).

Apart from these talented running gods (some of those who chose their parents very cleverly) the cost of racing both is too excessive.

After the mountainous and arduous 56 kilometres of the Two Oceans most runners’ legs are too battered and their bodies too exhausted to successfully tackle another, even tougher ultramarathon. Chat to this year’s finishers. I doubt if many of them will be in the mood for another intense contest.

The old running textbooks and coaches used to recommend a day’s recovery for every mile raced. Experience has taught me those old textbooks were not far wrong. The Two Oceans is an old fashioned 35 miler.

After 35 days of recovery that would leave just three weeks to train hard again for Comrades. It doesn’t sound possible or wise.

And yet the double is so tempting. The two races are two of the world’s most famous and iconic marathons. It’s heart-breaking to miss either event.

Rock ‘n roll

If I can stick to my earlier musical analogy: The Two Oceans is pure rock ‘n roll. It is famed for its beauty and for its fun, its sense of humour … This is summed up by some of those who have brought their particular brand of quirkiness to the race — The Pub of Eternal Despair and the giant six-runner shongololo spring to mind, while Noel Stamper’s mid race swim in the sea at Hout Bay is another.

Comrades is serious classical music. There is little to laugh about. The morning after Two Oceans a runner, sporting a couple of blisters, might limp onto a wine farm. The morning after Comrades a runner might wake up in Addington hospital.

No one considers running Comrades as a giant centipede or pantomime horse. Nor are any Comrades runners keen to “do a Noel Stamper’ and nip off for a quick dip in Inanda Dam; it’s just too serious a challenge to risk catastrophe.

Even the respective finishers’ medals emphasise the differences between the two races. The Two Oceans medal is an exciting new design every year. It is always flashy and slightly boastful. The Comrades medal is small, understated and simple, Hermes.

But here is the good news, it is not necessary to sacrifice one for the other. It is possible to run them both. It is indeed possible to have your cake and eat it. It’s just that one must be a training run and the other a race.

Over the years many runners have chosen to run Two Oceans as an exciting training run for Comrades. I always made Two Oceans my rock ‘n roll fun run. It is the perfect long training run.