On the 30th April 2022, I participated in the Spar Community Challenge Series at Airport Junction Mall. This is a 9-part running series with monthly runs from April until December, with two distances, 5K and 10K. There is a leader board for each race (and series) with overall winners to be announced at the final race. There are also spot prizes and finisher medals at each event. The challenge is in support of the Gamodubu community about 25km from Gaborone.
Following my Ultra, I’ve been taking things easy – running for fun without a particular goal. This week though, I resumed more structured training with my eye on a few 15K and Half Marathon races. With all my endurance training (and little to no speedwork) the last year, I’ve lost a lot of speed and I’m looking to reclaim it one run at a time. So this Spar Community Challenge Series couldn’t be more perfectly timed. It will keep me focused as I work on getting faster again.
The 10km race was starting at 06:15 and as we only live a short distance from APJ, we left the house at 05:55 to be there for a quick warm-up. When we arrived, there was only a small crowd warming up on the lawn with the Penalty Box trainer. We stayed close to the gantry and caught up with our friends Naema and Elisa. I’ve been experiencing a bit of social anxiety so was initially nervous to be in a crowd setting, but as we chatted with that buzz of excitement in the air, I felt comfortable and just thought “How wonderful that races are back!?”
The route was an out-and-back on the Phakalane Road, not one I do very often. I had planned to incorporate my scheduled speed session for the week – a 2km warm-up followed by 5x 400m speed intervals, and then cool down. But I threw the strategy out the window when Elisa changed her distance from 5km to 10km – I haven’t run with her in so long so decided I’d rather focus on keeping it conversational (but strong) in the first half and then tempo in the second half. Our first km was a speedy (for me) 6:57min/km but we slowed it down a tad bit with splits: 7:09/ 7:16/ 7:15 and then a mighty push up an incline with 7:34 pace. We turned around the 6km mark (7:31) and headed back. We stopped talking around 7km (7:15) as we felt the strain.
Shortly after this, Elisa told me to push ahead. I drank my last bit of water and regretted not taking more at the last stop. With 3km left, I turned it up aiming for a sub-7 pace. I succeeded with a steady – 6:57/ 6:56/ 6:57. Ditiro came back for me around 9km and rescued me with water. When my trusty Garmin signalled 10km, my time was 1:11:46 but I knew I was at least a km from the finish! But as my cousin says, “Extra km for free!” My pace dropped to 7:23 for the 11th but I found some energy in the last 250m for a solid sprint and, yes, with my hands in the air! A respectable 7:11min/pace for 11km, probably my fastest in a year, and with a 170 ave. heart rate, 92% in Zone 5, and my Garmin telling me I was overreaching, I’d say I gave it my all!
There was a cool down session with Penalty Box at the end but of course, Ditiro, Elisa and I decided to take a few photos at the end. #Priorities, right?!
Aside from the late start (06:42am) and longer course (11km), this was a beautiful event – gorgeous Botswana skies, perfect 13˚C temps, two water stops, encouraging marshals, and very professional and friendly police present at the intersections. With the slight elevation, the route tested our strength and of course we were rewarded with gorgeous medals at the end!
If you’d like to join the movement – please register for the remaining runs at SPAR stores (Kgale, Village, Airport Junction and Acacia), GRIP Runner (Sebele Mall) or online at http://www.ucbtiming.co.bw. Here is the schedule.
Are you taking part in the Spar Challenge Series? What’s your favourite distance? What goals are you working on? Does endurance training make you slower?
I’m joining two amazing runners, Kim from Running on the Fly and Deborah from Confessions from a Mother Runner for their link up, the “Weekly Run Down”. Hop on over to their blogs and others, and be inspired.
The Gaborone Runner 
Congrats on a well-paced race! Aren’t you glad you went?
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So excited to have races back! Next one is this coming Saturday so we will be back out there!
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that is fun that there is a series of races to do over the year. You all look so happy! Congrats!
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And hopefully this encourages the bigger Races to return as well!
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Awesome job, Shathiso!! I can only imagine how great that felt. I love that quote…”extra km for free!” Now that’s a stellar attitude:-)
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Haha! It’s such a positive way of looking at things!
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Sounds like you had a really fun time! Cool medal too!
I can’t imagine you feeling shy socially, but I understand not being able to cope with crowds again yet.
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Such a fun time and I loved the medal! I’m naturally very shy but I’ve always pushed myself out there. But with pandemic I didn’t have to push myself to socialise and I think I now feel completely out of practice which is causing a bit of anxiety.
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Awesome job and it’s great to see you back to racing! I also love that race medal too.
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I also thought it was such a cool medal!
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Great work Shathiso! Sounds like a really great community event, well-organized too.
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Thank you Jessie! Looking forward to doing as many runs as I can in the series!
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Love your finish line photo! It does look like a spectacular day. But a whole extra km? That’s mean!
Of course I’ve never done an ultra or even a marathon, but in general I think the lack of running fast and running less has definitely effected my pace. Which is ok! Right now I’m just happy to keep moving forward. 🙂
Looking forward to hearing about the rest of your races!
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That extra km really threw a spanner in the works! 🤣🤣
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I can only imagine! I don’t think I’ve ever had a race quite that over. You did great! You mental toughness has really grown the last few years.
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It’s great that in person events are back.
I do worry that we are not through with COVID, or that it is not through with us!
But Sunday I did enjoy a nice 5K race and hanging out with some of my running buddies.
Enjoy the series!
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It feels like we might finally be getting back to normal… but like you say, we just don’t know!
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What a fun challenge! You get to run a race every month and see how your pace changes during the course of the year. It looks like you had a great time.
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Exactly!!! I felt so motivated after the first one so I think it will help me with consistency!
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Well done! It’s hard to transition back to normal running after the ultra – I took ages to not automatically walk up hills after mine!
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It’s such a weird feeling! I’m definitely so much slower than pre-ultra training but at the same time I feel a lot stronger!!
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Congrats! And that sounds like a great idea for a race: a series of races over some months. Love it!
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So much fun and great motivation to keep going until the end of the year!
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