Siboniso fired up for Gun Run Trail success

The cover has been blown on one of the best kept secrets in trail running – the OUTsurance Gun Run Trail Run.  Elites and trail enthusiasts alike have signed up for the second event at this year’s Gun Run weekend festival of running on 16-17 September.

While the trail prize money does not yet begin to match that of its lucrative half marathon counterpart, where first male and female athlete across the line pocket R25 000, it is nonetheless an attraction for local trailers who often race for little more than the passion of being out on the mountain.

Start of last year’s inaugural OUTSurance Gun Run Trail Run at Van Riebeek Park. Photo – Stephen Granger

Any runners who might be contemplating racing the scenic Gun Run route from from Van Riebeek Park, Oranjezicht, to Green Point Common had better move quickly as fewer than fifty entries are still on offer before the ‘house full’ signs go up.

The 17.8km run begins with a testing climb up to the Table Mountain contour path and ends with a downhill dash to the Green Point Common after runners pass close by the Noon Day Gun which gave birth to the event in the early 1990s.

Tashwell Damons in second place half way through the 2022 OUTsurance Gun Run Trail Run before going on to win. Photo – Stephen Granger

Last year’s inaugural race winners, Tashwell Damons and Nicky Wills, are solid performers but not regular podium finishers and were delighted with their accolades.

Bellville-based Ivan Robinson led the field through halfway in last year’s race, before Damons took over on the climb up Signal Hill Road, racing clear to victory.  Wills enjoyed a pillar to post win, finishing 10 minutes clear of runner-up Andrea Vogel with grand-master Maxine Reilly a close third.

Nicky Wills on her way to victory in the inaugural OUTsurance Gun Run Trail Run last year. Photo – Stephen Granger

This year’s race will be far more intense up front, with the OUTsurance Gun Run now occupying a place on trail runners’ calendars, as it has for the country’s leading road runners for three decades.

Top track and trail athlete, Siboniso Soldaka, is amongst the entries and is likely to be tough to beat. Racing in the colours of Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Soldaka has set the second fastest 3000m steeplechase time this year and represented South Africa at the World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in Innsbruck in June, where he was second South African home in the 13km Mountain Classic Race.

Racing on the track in Belgium as a warm-up to the championships, he won a 5000m track race in Belgium in tough, windy conditions.

Siboniso Soldaka in action in the Ultra-trail Drakensberg 21km in April. Photo – Stephen Granger

No stranger to trail, Soldaka has twice won the Cape Town Peace Trail 22km, a route which includes part of that for the Gun Run Trail Run, and he finished a close fourth against the best in the country in the Ultra-trail Drakensberg 21km to gain selection for the national team.  He will be out to confirm his status as one of the country’s best in the discipline at the Gun Run Trail Race.

“My training is coming together well,” said Soldaka. “I have fully recovered from the World Championships and I’m going strong. I have not yet raced since the World Championships.

Siboniso Soldaka in action in the 13,7km Mountain Classic at the World Mountain and Trail Championships in Innsbruck, Austria, in June this year. Photo – Stephen Granger

“My first race will be Western Province Cross Country Championships this weekend (Saturday 19 August) and then I will prepare for Gun Run and Cape Town Peace Trail Runs in the next two months.  I am not familiar with the Gun Run route but I would love to do a few sessions on it before the race.”

Runners who move quickly may grab one of the last entries through the race website on https://www.outsurance.co.za/gunrun/.