May 04

CIRCUMNAVIGATE LESOTHO: A 1100KM TRAVERSE BY RYAN SANDES AND RYNO GRIESEL

Posted by Héctor Rubio on May 4, 2022 in trail running, Ultra Trail | Leave a comment

CIRCUMNAVIGATE LESOTHO: A 1100KM TRAVERSE BY RYAN SANDES AND RYNO GRIESEL . Our TRAIL RUNNING AFRICA section celebrates a new achievement of this South African duo.

Ryan Sandes and Ryno Griesel have achieved another extraordinary feat by completing the 1,100 km bypass of the African country Lesotho in 16 days, 6 hours and 56 minutes.

The daily average with an average of just 69 km. We start with video summary 4min and then we go with the chronicle.

CIRCUMNAVIGATE LESOTHO: A 1100KM TRAVERSE BY RYAN SANDES AND RYNO GRIESEL

South African ultrarunners Ryan Sandes and Ryno Griesel have combined to produce another extraordinary feat when they circumnavigated almost 1,100km of the landlocked African country Lesotho in 16 days, 6 hours and 56 minutes, for an average of just shy of 69km or a little more than one and a half marathons, every day.

Sandes and Griesel previously embarked on the ultimate Drakensberg adventure – the Drakensberg Grand Traverse – in 2014 when they ran 204km non-stop while they smashed the Great Himalaya Trail record in 2018 with a new mark of 25 days, three hours and 24 minutes.

CIRCUMNAVIGATE LESOTHO: A 1100KM TRAVERSE

This time around, the legendary duo overcame huge physical and mental hurdles to tackle the mammoth circumnavigation that included over 33,000m of elevation along the borders of the beautiful country.

Cape Town native Sandes, 40, revealed: “It was definitely a lot more challenging than we initially anticipated, especially the extreme weather we experienced in the mountain section – ice, snow and severe cold. There were some really cold nights out there, where we didn’t think we would make it through. All those curve balls make for real epic adventure with some incredible memories I’ll hold onto forever. We’ve been on enough crazy adventures together to know that the key is ultimately trust and respect. I wouldn’t want to have achieved this with anyone else.”

Griesel, 42, added: “It felt like we were building a puzzle. Often we had to take a couple of steps back to move forward again and that was mentally quite challenging. Running through the mud and doing multiple river crossings was pretty slow going.

THE ROUTE

What is certain is that the couple embarked on a real adventure. Even through numerous reconnaissances over the past 13 months, they explored only about 40% of the route.
Before starting the first reconnaissance, Ryno built a rough path in Google Earth.

“I basically built it by bringing it closer and farther away. You can’t really use normal GPS software like Basecamp because the areas we go into, like at the east end, are very remote, so you have to use Google Earth to read the terrain arrangement and contours and then build a route from there.”

So they had a rather crude “route guide” that they then used as a base during reconnaissance, which led to various routes on the GPS trackers.

According to Ryno: “We recorded the whole section in the reconnaissances and then all that was put back together in Google Earth or in the GPS software. Then I sat non-stop for 60 hours in front of the computer about three weeks ago to plot the route point by point.”

The trail, which began and concluded at the Telle Bridge Border Post, commenced on 10 April 2022 and took them to the most remote and untouched regions of the Mountain Kingdom and South Africa.

They covered the length of the entire Drakensberg Mountain range and summited some of Lesotho’s most breathtaking peaks, including Mafadi Peak – the highest mountain in South Africa at 3,446.1m.

As ever, in the daunting projects that the pair undertake, Mother Nature did not provide them with a smooth trip on their home continent as they had to endure freezing weather and dangerous flooding.

They encountered brutal temperatures ranging from -5° on the mountains up to 30° degrees in the lower lands, while 23 pairs of socks were worn during their “toughest challenge yet”.

CIRCUMNAVIGATE LESOTHO: RYAN SANDES USES THE NEW SALOMON S/LAB GENESIS

AS we presented you here, the S/LAB Genesis is a race-grade shoe to take on more than just a competition, it paves the way for a new type of highly-committed trail-runner, who wants to go the distance and share experiences. And obviously what better that 1100 km around unknown terrain to introduce them to the wolrd.

The feet stay protected thanks to the Matryx fabric, a reinforced toe cap in the front and extra protection on the side, so you can run through rocky and technical terrain without the constant fear of that unpleasant foot-to-rock feeling.