Mighty Melikhaya takes 2nd place in mammoth marathon

KNYSNA -

Well-known

Knysna runner and captain of the Knysna Marathon Club Melikhaya Msizi pushed himself to the absolute limit at the PE Backyard

Ultra this past weekend, running 174,2km in 26 hours to finish in second place.

Msizi has been a runner in Knysna for

12 years now and is well known within the running fraternity for his exploits on both road and trails. He has completed two Comrades marathons and a best performance of just over seven hours earned him a silver medal in 2019.

But, for all of his running experience and prowess, he has never taken part in a backyard ultramarathon. For those unaware, the backyard ultra is a form of ultramarathon race where competitors must consecutively run a distance of 6 706 metres in less than one hour. After completion of each lap, the remaining time within the hour is typically used to recover. But, when that hour mark comes, you begin the lap again.

This process is repeated until there is just one man or woman left standing. It is truly an incredible test of the human spirit.

The format is being brought to SA by various parties, but Wanado Events are the organisers of the series in which Msizi took part.

The PE Backyard Ultra was the fourth race in the series, following on from races in Pretoria, Durban and Cape Town.

It was held at 3 River Trails, about 41km outside Gqeberha. Along with the 26 other runners Msizi started the race on Saturday 18 September at 07:00.

The field powered on throughout the day, lap after lap. By the 12-hour mark when night fell, the field was down to only eight runners and Msizi was still going strong.

Four laps and four hours later it was down to the final two after third-place Willem Esterhuyse was unable to continue past the 16lap mark. By this point, runners had already completed 107,2km, but the end was nowhere in sight just yet. Msizi was in the final two alongside Mossel Bay runner Tembinkosi Sojola, who had won the Durban Backyard Ultra by running 25 laps. Both men were determined to push the other as far as they humanly could go. They ran side by side, lap after lap, hour after hour, taking turns to share headlamps through the night. Sometimes if they needed a bathroom break they'd push a bit harder on a lap to get back with enough time to recover and use the bathroom. They would also take short power naps whenever they could.

At 07:00, when the sun had risen on the 24-hour mark, the two runners had run 160,9km.

But they pushed on. The end was around the corner though, as after lap 26 and 174,2km of running Msizi had to call it quits due to severe blisters on his feet.

In the backyard ultra the winner only completes one lap more than the second-placed comrade, so Sojola returned home after lap 27, having completed 181km around the loop. It truly was a battle of determination and seeing who would cave first, and if it were not for Msizi's blisters, who knows how far he could have gone?