What does that have to do with the image ("borrowed" from Google Maps)? That will also have to wait for the SFAD. Some of my South African running friends may recognize that landmark, though often having approached it from the opposite direction. That is a naval gun at Lower North Battery, between Glencairn and Simon's Town, a couple of miles before the finish of the Peninsula Marathon (now the Cape Peninsula Marathon) at the SA Naval Sports Ground in Simon's Town. (The marathon and the sports ground are also peripherally related to the SFAD.)
Back in the '70s and '80s the winners of that marathon were a who's who of the local and (later) the national running scene. Most internationally-famous was 1982 winner, Mark Plaatjes who later sought political asylum in the US and won gold for the US in the marathon at the 1993 World Championships.
My first Peninsula was in 1977, my third marathon and first sub-3 time. I managed a little under 2:55 despite having to make a pit-stop. There were no Porta-potties in those days - I had to go through and out the back of a convenience store. First and second that year were two fellow University of Cape Town (UCT) students, Bruce Robinson and Peter Hodson. They were running for a new club, Varsity Old Boys, that they had helped form partly with the aim of being one of the first running clubs in the country to be open to all races. Later that year I started running regularly with Bruce and Peter. Trying to keep up with them was a big reason for a 19-minute improvement in my next marathon later in 1977.
Looking at a clipping from that 1977 race, another finisher was Steve Harle, one of my first regular running partners. A year or two later Steve and his wife were tragically murdered by an escaped convict when they were hiking/camping in a remote wilderness area.
Didn't run the race in 1978, for a reason that is a big part of the SFAD. Ran it again in 1979, nearly 20 minutes faster than in 1977 but a minute or two slower than two PRs I'd managed in the interim. At the end of 1979 I moved to Pretoria. Didn't run Peninsula in March 1980 because I'd run the Pretoria Marathon a week earlier in 2:30:46 (the one and only time I won a marathon), after setting a PR of 2:30:40 just 3 weeks before that. (I ran 2 more marathons in the next 4 weeks.)
In February 1981 I managed to get under 2:30 for the first time and then went to Cape Town for a month (related to the SFAD, a required Navy "camp"), which enabled me to run Peninsula again, in a new PR of 2:26:23 (with PRs in a 20-mile road race and for 5,000m and 10,000m on the track between the two marathons, the two track races being on the same day). According to my logbook, I had a DNF in the 1982 edition of the race. I have no recollection of running it - or even being in Cape Town at that time. I was still living in Pretoria and Rietta and I were getting married about a month later and moving to Cape Town soon after.
In the 1983 edition I ran my all-time PR (2:25:51). The next year the race was run in reverse, to try to avoid the headwind that often made things tough on the point-to-point course. According to my logbook I ran 2:33, though again I have no recollection of running the race or even of ever having run it in that direction. A few FB friends were also in that race, including Ron Boreham, who won in 2:17, Bob de la Motte (4th in 2:20), first veteran (age 40+, called a "master" here in the US) Brian Mather in 2:29 and frequent training partner Graeme Dacomb in 2:30.
Missed the race in 1985 because I was recovering from Achilles tendon surgery. At the end of 1985 we moved back to Pretoria. Thanks to lack of fitness and surgery on the other Achilles tendon I didn't get to run the race again before we moved to Seattle.
As the site of several PRs, including what will forever be my 1st and 3rd fastest marathons, I have fond memories of the race despite its association with the SFAD.
My times in the Peninsula Marathon
1977: 2:54:55
1979: 2:37:22
1981: 2:26:23
1982: DNF
1983: 2:25:51
1984: 2:33:02
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