Robert Rorich ran his way to Red Bull LionHeart victory on Saturday 21 October in a time of 27:17, outgunning Timothy Chambers and Oriole Bolus for the title. – Red Bull Content Pool
The relative newcomer played an excellent tactical game, holding back during the elimination heats on the way to the final, knowing that he would have to complete the 4,2km route with some 390m of climbing four times on the day. Conditions were perfect for running – sunny and warm but with a light southerly keeping conditions cool.
The high intensity trail-running elimination race was the brainchild of Ryan Sandes who wanted to create a fun, innovative event where he could share the mountain with as many people as possible and formalise (without compromising its core roots, of course) #TamingTheLion, the underground time-trial up-and-back from the SanParks hut.
The race saw the top 100 men (from the Strava qualifier) evenly assigned (depending on their qualifier time) to one of four groups of 25 to run the up-and-down route once against the clock. Those who finished under the cut-off time of 38 minutes made it through to the next round. This made for super short recovery times between heats – around 10 minutes – and made for some very tactical racing during the elimination heats.
The top 30 women also qualified based on the Strava leaderboard and it was Annamart Loubser who claimed the title in a time of 35:10 beating Toni McCann and Julika Pike. Loubser finished second in 2016 and took a step to the top of the podium this year.
The men’s intermediate race was won by Lunga Nolakana in a time of 30:45, with Matt Lennon in second place.
GALLERY
