Modern Athlete Magazine Issue 123, October 2019 | Page 20

THE RUNNING
MANN
By Stuart Mann
Doubling Down in Dundee
Two trips in three weeks to run around the historic Dundee are of KwaZulu-Natal presented me with two very different
race experiences.
Dorothy Nyembe Marathon
Marathon #219 / Unique Marathon #124 / 21 July 2019
The Dorothy Nyembe Marathon was a bit of a shambles
T
he first Dorothy Nyembe Marathon was
supposed to be held on 16 December 2017.
The race was well advertised, took plenty of
entries, and was then ‘postponed’ at short notice.
Runners who’d entered were told it was “against
the rules” to provide refunds – not sure what the
Consumer Protection Act would say about that – but
their entries would still be valid the following year
when the race was held.
Well, 2018 came and went without any further mention
of the race, but the 2019 race calendar surprised us
by including the race in mid-July. I was somewhat
dubious about whether the race would actually go
ahead, and therefore I waited until the last minute
before entering. Based on previous experiences, I
approach inaugural races with extreme caution, but
some superbly organised first-time marathons like the
Hippo in Richards Bay had lulled me into a false sense
of security. The warning signs were there but I failed
to heed them...
Hurry Up & Wait
The race was on Sunday, but number collection was
listed as being on the Thursday and Friday only. I
asked whether ‘sensible’ Saturday collection (for
those travelling) would be added, and was told they
would get back to me. They never did, but there
was an online announcement that numbers could
be collected on Saturday from 9am to 5pm. Well,
20
the early bird might get the worm, but the early
runner won’t get their race number until well into
the afternoon in Dundee... The organisers eventually
pulled in after 1pm with the race numbers. I arrived
about 15 minutes before registration closed and there
was still a massive pile of uncollected race numbers –
I suspect the majority of these were from the original
batch of 2017entrants.
I assume that the original idea for the start location
was to honour the Battle of Blood River, fought on
16 December 1838. However, the start is near to, but
not actually at the Ncome/Blood River heritage site.
My email enquiry about transport to the start is still
pending a promised response, but at registration we
were told that there would be taxis that would leave at
3am from the finish venue for R50.
Three hours to make a 40km journey seemed a bit
of an overkill. Also, Dundee is absolutely freezing in
winter, and I did not fancy spending over two hours
waiting around aimlessly in sub-zero temperatures
before the 6am start. My follow-up investigations
revealed that the last taxi would leave at 4:30am,
so that was the one I aimed for. I duly arrived
at 4:25am... and caught the first taxi to leave at
4:45am. Luckily the lead car arrived at the start at
the same time as that lead taxi, or there would have
been no indication that a marathon was about to
take place.
ISSUE 124 OCTOBER 2019 / www.modernathlete.co.za
There was still about an hour to go until the
scheduled start and we were completely exposed to
the bitterly cold elements. My wife has been nagging
me to clean out my clothes cupboard, and I figured
a win-win solution was to arrive at the start wearing
several layers of clothing that I planned to discard
along the route, so I had five layers of clothing
on, but my body was still rapidly spiralling into
hypothermia as the sub-zero temperatures and light
breeze took their toll. Just before my body went into
complete anaphylactic shock and the battlefields
claimed another victim, my brain fired a last-gasp
survival SOS and I barged my way into the lead car
to take refuge in the passenger seat.
Besides warmth, another benefit of my seat inside
the lead vehicle was getting inside information on the
behind the scenes shenanigans. All signs pointed
to a very delayed start as messages were relayed
about late-arriving runners still on their way to the
start. Luckily Brian Jarmey-Swan was on race referee
duty, and not wanting to have blood on his hands –
or frostbite on his own fingers – he insisted that the
race get started as quickly as possible. Thanks to his
efforts, we eventually got going around 6:20am, just
as the sun was starting to rise.
There could not have been more than 50 runners at
the start, so I was surprised to see afterwards that the
race had 103 finishers. Even with a late start, there
were still many even later starters. I heard afterwards
that runners had been told various different starting
times “on the radio” and via other communications.
Also, several runners seemed to have emerged along
the route, and Brian was kept busy after the race with
disqualification discussions and decisions.
No more than 50 runners lined up for the
start... Somehow 103 finished the race
Surviving the Battlefields
Freezing Conditions