Sport / Anderson sets sights on top 20 in searing South African challenge
James Anderson will take on 55km course in Cape Town
ULTRA-marathon runner James Anderson is targeting a top 20 finish when he confronts Cape Town’s gruelling 55km course later this month.
Anderson, who lives in Gulberwick, has made a name for himself in the running scene by taking on daring and unique endurance tests across the UK and beyond.
He completed the extreme 100km long Mont Blanc trail through the mountains in August last year, in a time of 21 hours and three minutes.
This month he is heading to Africa for the first time to take on Cape Town’s 55km ultra-trail event – and targeting a time of around six hours, 15 minutes too.
The ambitious Anderson has been training for more than 10 months for his South African adventure on 21 November, which comes with a draining 2,500m of elevation.
“Training for a race like this while living in Shetland means getting creative,” he told Shetland News.
One thing which Anderson has focused on trying to acclimatise his body for is the South African heat.
He heads there with Cape Town steadily moving into summer, with temperatures already touching 30°C.
That makes an already gruelling test that much more difficult for someone training in Shetland in November, but Anderson has come up with a way to prepare his body for the searing elements.
“I’ve been spending about an hour, hour and a half in the Haar Sauna at Bigton,” he said.
“Over the past four months I’ve been hitting the sauna three or four times a week to try simulate the heat and to help with heat adaptation and recovery ahead of South Africa.”
Anderson said his latest training block had been “more about elevation than speed”, while focusing on building his climbing strength and resilience.
“We don’t have the big mountain climbs you’ll find in Cape Town, so my focus has been on building strength and endurance through lots of hilly trail loops, steady elevation repeats and treadmill sessions on incline to simulate the longer climbs.
“It’s been a solid stretch of training – trusting the process, making the most of what Shetland has to offer and getting out on the hills for my long runs.
“A favourite of mine is the hill between East Voe and Quarff, which has a nice and steep climb.”
He has been running between 80-100km a week for the past three to four months, training for a total of 12 hours every seven days.
Detailing his training schedule, Anderson said he had been running 15km on a Tuesday, an “easy” 12km on Wednesday, 20km across morning and night on Thursday, 8km on Friday and then an 18km hill session on a Saturday.
Just to round the week off nicely, he has been doing a three-hour long, 30km “easy” hill session on a Sunday.
“The closer we get to the event it’s been more hilly treadmill session for heat adaption and road long runs to get more speed in my steady running for economy,” he added.
“Just one more big week then I’ll start to taper off.”
Anderson is expecting a “dusty” race later this month, with the event starting at 7am local time to avoid the worst of the afternoon heat – unless you are still racing up until the 9.30pm cut-off.
With almost 6,600 miles for Anderson and partner Kristen Wishart just to get to the start line, the pair are making the most of their South African sojourn.
“We’re going out there for two weeks,” he said.
“If I’m going all the way to South Africa I want to go on holiday too! We’re going on a safari too.
“I’ll probably be feeling it in my legs for a few days afterwards.”
The 55km Cape Town ultra-trail race takes place on Friday 21 November.
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