Sharing experiences is what life is all about and I was very happy to share this race experience with Puseletso Dladla, a local KZN runner and newly enthused OCR racer. Puseletso lives in Bothas Hill and when she showed interest in doing a bit of OCR’ing, I was very happy to show her the ropes..pun intended:)

This was the first time I raced the Waterra at their home base in Botha’s Hill. I had heard rumours about the venue and the steep hills the in race…the rumours are true, steep hills, great technical terrain, obstacles a lot more difficult than anticipated but all in all a great experience.

I loved running with Puseletso, she has a huge smile and tried her best to do all the obstacles. We managed to do most of them but was caught out by the pegboard obstacle! on my first attempt, I almost got to the end but my grip strength just failed suddenly and I could not hold on. You have to use an immense amount of precise power to get this one right. 

I tried and tried but at the end just did not have the grip strength to keep going and I decided that I was there to have fun and losing my band was just a small thing compared to having fun with a friend! 

So Puseletso and I decided to move on, bandless. And yes, I still had fun and still loved the experience!

The next few obstacles we hit was still quite difficult and I did not really try hard enough to get through all the sections but rather enjoyed doing sections of it and used it as a good training session.

The final obstacle was long and tough but I was happy that I could complete the hanging hockey balls sections fairly well, something I used to struggle a lot. Small gains over time will show benefits down the line.

Thank you Puseletso for sharing a fun morning on the trails with me. Till next time