Rorich and Marshall fly high in the sky at Mont Rochelle

by Stephen Granger

Robbie Rorich and Kerry-Anne Marshall raced to impressive victories at the Mont Rochelle Skyrace at Franchhoek over the weekend with a top-quality field enjoying a great day of mountain running in cold and windy conditions. 

One of the toughest ‘short distance’ races around, Mont Rochelle has provided a tough challenge over the years to trail athletes wishing to test themselves on some serious ascents and downhills. A five kilometre climb up to the top of Franchhoek Pass along ‘Kat se Pad’ was followed by a testing summit of Du Toit’s Peak at 1407m. An undulating section led to the final ascent of Perdekop, often snow covered in the winter at 1535m, before the final bone-jarring 9km back to the start in the town centre.

Rorich closed five minutes on Kane Reilly in the second half of the race, making full use of his skills on the technical descents to take the lead on the Kat se Pad descent and hold of Reilly by just 33 seconds to clinch victory and retain the title he won last year.

“I could see him closing on me on the descent of Perdekop and knew I was being hunted,” said Reilly, who appeared none the worse for wear following his abortive UTMB CCC 100km in the French Alps just 8 days before the Franchhoek race. “But I was hoping that I would be able to use my speed on the final section on the roads to take the win. But although I was running at 3 min 15 sec per kilometre pace at the end, I couldn’t close the gap.” 

Reilly used his supremacy on the climb to run clear of challengers Kyle Bucklow and Siviwe Nkombi to reach the cloud-covered Du Toit’s Peak 9km into the race in 55min 43 sec to clinch the King of the Mountain award, with Bucklow two minutes behind in second. Oli Morris was a further minute back with Rorich fourth, five minutes off the lead.

Eschewing her customary cautious approach at the start, Marshall found herself in front of the women’s race in 9^th overall, after exchanging the lead with George-based teenager Rebecca Kohne in the early stages of the climb up Kat se Pad. Marshall was over six minutes up on Kohne in taking the Queen of the Mountain title on Du Toit’s Peak.

Had there been a view at the peak, Reilly was in no mood to stop and take it in and swept down the slopes of Du Toit’s Peak to the Uitkyk Aid Station before racing on to tackle the climb up Perdekop. Rorich had made up ground and had moved into second on Perdekop, although Reilly remained well clear in front.

Marshall remained in pole position in the women’s race, climbing strongly to the highest point of the race before commencing the long descent to the finish.

The race was filled with drama as two of South Africa’s leading trail athletes went head to head and toe to toe, with Rorich flying down the challenging descent of Perdekop and Reilly doing his best to stay in front. In the end the gradient in the latter stages favoured Rorich and he swept to his second victory of the winter, after winning Muizenberg Trail Race in June.

Rorich’s time of 2:34:59 was just over three minutes inside the time he set last year, with Reilly also well within Rorich’s previous record. Bucklow continued his consistent form through the season to claim third, four minutes adrift of Reilly.

Marshall extended her lead to eleven minutes over Kohne by the finish to cross the line in an excellent 3:05:30 – 22 minutes inside Karien Bezuidenhout’s winning time last year – with Emily Djock taking third, seven minutes behind Kohne.

“It was the first time I’d raced at Mont Rochelle,” said Marshall. “And I really loved it.  I’m pleased that my training seems to be picking up and I feel I’m getting stronger towards my target race at Ultra-trail Cape Town at the end of the year. I tried running harder from the start just to see how I would cope with that. I felt it turned out well, although I did cramp a bit again towards the end so still have work to do on conditioning.”

Results: Mont Rochelle SkyRace 26km

Men

1 Robbie Rorich 2:34:59; 2 Kane Reilly 2:35:32; 3 Kyle Bucklow 2:39:21; 4 Oli Morris 2:43:22; 5 Siviwe Nkombi 2:49:52; 6 Roelof Mostert 2:53:41; 7 Rocco Zizzamia 2:55:32; 8 Wano Katjiri 2:56:16; 9 Damien Schumann 3:04:55; 10 Ryan Romans 3:05:37

Women

1 Kerry-Anne Marshall 3:05:30; 2 Rebecca Kohne 3:16:53; 3 Emily Djock 3:23:56; 4 Anja Laubscher 3:26:59; 5 Kate Mapham 3:31:45; 6 Jada Linstrom 3:35:35; 7 Melissa Laing 3:38:28; 8 Mags Wright 3:41:04; 9 Chloe Bishop 3:45:24; 10 Lee Ann Persse 3:50:54