Results

Ah man! We hate it when a good thing comes to an end. After a super exciting day of racing at Leeuwenkloof on Sunday 8 July, that’s a wrap as we wave Gauteng farewell, and get prepped and pumped for the Cape Winter Trail Series®.

The weather played out perfectly for Race 4. The cold front travelled up from Cape Town, but only brought just enough to leave a fresh bite in the air. Warm enough to start without a long sleeves, but cool enough for runners not to overheat.

Race 4 included the all new 23km XL course at Leeuwenkloof. Arguably one of the best medium distance trail routes in the high veld. The course took runners through forests, streams, technical rocky single tracks, some tough climbs, a cave and some typical bush veld trails with views of Hartbeespoortdam and the Magalies Mountain Range. The XL set out at 8am, the unknown course causing a surprisingly serious undertone in the chute, but they were all smiles and stoke when they came in.

Men’s XL Results:

1st: Bradly Claase - 01-51:58

2nd: Dillom Mc Evoy - 01:52:00

3rd: Grant Johnson - 01:52:10

They all finished within seconds of each other. The heat was on out on course, but apparently this was the order they ran in for the bulk of the race. They also took a collective wrong turn towards the end, adding 1km to their run and still managed to hold on to the 3 podium positions.

Women’s XL Results:

1st: Sandra Mansvelder 02:05:56

Sandra was also 5th overall, and won the ladies race by 20mins. She said at the finish line that the course was super tough. She rocked the long course last year and came back for the XL this year, was expecting a tough run, but "sjoe" was her finish line statement!

2nd: Marjoelein Mansvelder 02:25:46

3rd: Veronica Warmington 02:39:28

In the long course, Ryno van Vollenhoven made his mark as the current Gauteng Trail Series® King, having won both the Challenge and now the Championship titles.

Men’s Long Course Results:

1st: Ryno Van Vollenhoven 00:57:02

2nd: James Reid 00:59:22 "Race went as usual, Ryno shot out the start at a stupid pace, impossible to hold on to." "Rad course, super technical and fun"

3rd: Allan Ross 00:59:59

Women’s Long Course Results:

 

1st: Chelsea Harrup 01:13:59

2nd: Fiona Butler 01:14:02 (a neck on neck battle out on course for first place, Chelsea came out on top)

3rd: Jaime Davidson: 01:16:45

Men’s Short Course Results: 

1st: Dylan Mitchley 00:40:13 - taking the win and also cementing his mark as overall winner in the junior category for the challenge.

2nd: Rob Donkin 00:42:38

3rd: Ian Fourie 00:45:03

These three became solid besties on the podium over the series.

Women’s Short Course Results:

1st: Shani Van Wyk 00:49:10. Whether she's on the podium, crossing the finish line, out running, you won’t ever catch Shani without a smile on her face. MC made note of this during prize giving, she just smiled and laughed some more.

2nd: Anri Celliers 00:51:02 

3rd: Robyn Dykes 00:55:04

It was a truly fun and festive end to the series on the longest route of all 4. Runners all had much to say about how technical, tough and beautiful the trail was. Every complaint about how tough it was, was delivered with a smile. That’s what we line up for.

Prize giving was long and festive with 3 race prize giving taking place, championship and challenge overall prize giving and loads of awesome spot prizes from our generous partners. Overall a fun series, with some serious racing at the sharp end, some festive running at the Instagram end.

Thanks to the partners who add magic to each event, and the overall series; Raidlight South Africa, Jaybird, Steenberg Vineyards, Mountain Dew and WWF.

Event images can be found here  and all the results right here.

Cape Town, we’re coming in HOT for the 2018 Cape Winter Trail Series®. Get those entries in! 

This past Sunday the grand finale of Spur Cape Summer Trail Series® 2017 (CSTS) took place on the beautiful mountain bike trails of Oak-Valley wine estate. The Elgin Valley dished out some of its best weather it had to offer, making for a perfect morning of running.

Oak-Valley’s epic mountain bike trails are normally closed off to runners, but once a year we get exclusive access for the Spur Trail Series® runners to head out and enjoy these fast, flowy and fun trails.

With this being more of a mountain bike trail as well and slightly less technical mountain running, it meant we were also in for an extremely fast morning of running. Especially after having a look at the start line up for the XL. Race 4 see’s the addition of the Elgin Valley Summer XL. And on Sunday we had some big names line up, the likes of  Nicholas Rupanga, Edson Kumwamba, Jarryd Dunn, Ben Brimble, Noel Ernstzen, Katya Soggot, Annamart Laubscher (Marloth 24,5km winner as well CTM Peace Trail Winner), Ashleigh Simonis, Tish Jones and wildcard Ben Matiso all lining up to take on the XL. Making for one extremely exciting morning of racing.

The XL set off at 6:30 and the heat was immediately turned right up with the front runners setting a silly pace of 3:05 for the first km. It wasn’t long before road running top dog Ben Matiso (top 20 at Comrades) decided to really put the gas down, and came sprinting across the finish line in incredible time of 1:42:50. Nicholas Rupanga came in nearly a minute after Ben to take 2nd place, and 3rd place male was Edson Kumwamba.

In The ladies race top duo Tish Jones and Ashleigh Simonis crossed the line together, with Tish Jones taking the top step in an impressive time of 1:55:22 and Ashleigh Simonis a mere 2 seconds behind her. Final spot on the ladies podium, Annamart Laubscher who crossed the line in a time of 1:58:36, this girl is making some serious noise out on the trail running scene with her impressive CV so far.

Even though the long course missed out on a few of the top runners due to them taking part in the XL it didn’t seem to slow this bunch down at all. Racing kicked off at 7:30 for the A-Batch. With Series favourite Raydon Balie still away on his training camp, Emmanuel Dlamini seized the moment by whipping around this 15,7km course in a time of 1:02:05. Coming in second and 3rd place respectively was Ricardo Jaftha and Enok Jimani.

Svenja Gliem took a clear win in the ladies race, in a time of 1:15:24. Second place, Julie Huckle, came in a good 4min behind Svenja, and claiming the last step in the ladies race was Devon Basson coming in 3rd.

The short course racing snakes came sprinting across the finish line as fast as they set out. First place went to Evan Fortuin in a time of 28:21, second Gershon Aziza and third Llewlyn Jacobs. First to fly over the finish line in the ladies race, after a strategic call to downgrade from the long course, was Chantel Berowsky, claiming her first Trail Series podium. Second place went to Jade Bremner and wrapping up the ladies podium for the day was Josie McCann.

A seriously fast paced and impressive morning of running was had by all and we couldn’t have asked for a more exciting way to finish off this excitement that was Cape Summer Trail Series® 2017.

A big congratulations to our overall series champs (see below) as well as to all who completed the series.

Championship Results:

Open Men

1. Emmanuel Dlamini

2. Jarryd Dunn

3. Ricardo Jaftha

Open Ladies

1. Sophie Cope

2. Emily Yeo

3. Lize Cornellius

Veteran Men

1. Shaun Gregory

2. Mogale Piloso

3. Mark Jacobson

Veteran Ladies

1. Julie Huckle

2. Bianca Daniels

3. Jane Fisher

Master Men

1. Neil Hermann

2. Arno Lawrenz

3. Hans Woermann

Master Ladies

1. Maxine Reilly

2. Paola Vignani

3. Elvera Schwan

Challenge Results:

Open Men

1. Dino Adams

2. Evan Fortuin

3. Llwelyn Jacobs

Open Ladies

1. Josie McCann

2. Caro Jordaan

3. Elmarie Meyer

Veteran Men

1. Rudi Bezuidenhout

2. Arno Rossouw

3. Bill Dunn

Veteran Ladies

1. Nicolette Herring

2. Frances Fuchs

3. Anneke Von Maltitz

Master Men

1. Leslie Chivell

2. Richard Rossiter

3. Gary Green

Master Ladies

1. Lollos Rodseth

2. Tania Morkel

3. Michelle Groenewaldt

Junior Male

1. Gershon Aziza

2. Daniel Arendse

3. Stephen Millard

Minimee

1. Jethro Dunn

2. Christiaan Engelbrecht

3. Jade Bremner

Thank you all for coming out to play on the dirty trails with us this summer. We had an absolute blast with everyone. We look forward to seeing you all at the winter series kicking off on the 23rd of July at Paul Cluver. Until then keep on choosing adventure and enjoy exploring all the wonderful trails this country of ours has to offer.

Shout out to all our sponsors and partners who help make the events just that much more awesome. Spur Steak Ranches, Raidlight, BOS Sport, Steenberg Vineyards and WWF.

For more race results click here, for series results click here and to check out the awesome race day photos click here.

This past Sunday saw the trail running calendar kick off with the first race of the Spur Cape Summer Trail Series® at Lebanon Forest in Elgin. After taking a beating from the wild fires last year, it was awesome to have all the fun single tracks back in action. The Cape decided to play along as well and dish out some delicious weather for runners to play in out on the trails.

First light came peeking out at 5:30am as runners started rolling in for registration and number collection. By 6:30am there was an exciting buzz in the air from all the runners getting ready to dust off those holiday legs and kick up some dirt. To add to the buzz was Wildrunner’s own bag of exciting news for 2017. First was the fact that Spur Trail Series® and Wildrunner turns 10 years young this year.

Then the addition of Raidlight as new apparel sponsor, this means a whole lot of awesome spot prizes, podium prizes up for grabs.

On that podium note, let’s get onto the racing for the day. In the long course Championship, there was a fast competitive field lined up on the start line. All of them ready to take on the course record set by the legend himself, Bernie Rukadza in 2015, a smashing time of 53:43.

All though flying over the finish line at a ridiculous pace, no one could come close to Bernie’s time. Taking the win on the day was Raydon Balie, in a time of 54:49, almost a minute behind him in second was Emmanuel Dlamini, taking the final step on the podium, just sneaking in in front of Jarryd Dunn, was Vincent Viet in a time of 55:44.

In the ladies long course Championship race, taking top honours for Race 1 was local road running star Ashleigh Simonis, in a time of 1:03:37. Shortly after her was Swiss track running champion, Fiammetta Troxler, and wrapping up the ladies podium was Sophie Cope in a time of 01:10:21.

The short course men’s challenge race saw Dino Adams smash Riaan Wildskut’s 2014 short course record by almost a minute, racing across the line in a time of 22:45. Hot on Dino’s heels, and also breaking the record was Evan Fortuin, who came in only 2 seconds behind Dino. And claiming 3rd place was Llewellyn Jacobs. Some ridiculously fast running put on out there in the short course.

In the ladies Challenge race, Liezl du Plooy came sprinting across the line in first place, a long way ahead from runners up Josie McCann and Chanel Hannah. These two had a great battle out on course, and in the end it was Josie who snuck in 5 seconds ahead of Chanel in a time of 32:32 to take second place.

Amazing running by all out there on Sunday. Lebanon never ceases to hand a fantastic dose of good dirt to go and play on.

If you acted crazy, or stopped to strike a pose at the Steenberg Camera Trap, go check out the album here on facebook to see if you’ve been snapped? If we missed you this Sunday, be sure to keep an eye out at the next race for those Steenberg Gates and you could be the next lucky winners who also stand a chance at winning the grand prize. For more details on the competition click here.

A big shout out and thank you to all our sponsors and partners; Spur Steak Ranches, Raidlight, BOS Sport, Steenberg Vineyards and WWF.

Check out your race results here and some the race photos here.