UP THE MOUNTAIN IN MY NEW SOCKS

I got given three pairs of socks to test the other day and after a couple of runs in the week I decided that they worked well enough to test them on a real run. Having been running for many years I know that not all socks are equal... Anyway today's test was twofold I was going to be out there for over 2 hours and it was going to be wet, very wet.
I parked the car at Constantia Nek just before 09h00, yes it's late, but I had to buy wine before I ran so I couldn't make it any earlier.

Back on the 3rd of July this year I had run this route with a couple of friends; Will, Jayde and Ake, on that day we got to Maclear's Beacon in a few seconds over an hour, so today I was aiming at breaking an hour. I thought it would be easy running on my own, but I wasn't taking the weather into account!

Most runs I break into sections, so the first section or leg of this run took me up the single tracks over the bridge past the Overseer's hut and the tap to the turn off to the single track. I thought I was ahead of time, but I was really a minute behind, My splits to Nursery and Skeleton were also a bit slow I hadn't picked it up, I still thought I had time to get to Maclear's in under an hour. Pushing on through the wind, rain and waterfalls (very impressive) I was 3min and 45 sec over the hour, I took the split and turned to Platterklip Without any protection from the wind and rain this was the toughest part of the run. I did try and keep to the rocks, but that was not always possible so I spent half the time in water. My new socks had now been wet for over an hour and they were holding out...

From Platterklip I turned left and headed through the valley of the red gods. This was going to be very slow as there are many wooden walk-ways and in the wind and rain they are very slippery and I didn't want to go bush diving!!! Only had a couple of undulations left and I was at Kasteels. No I didn't turn down I turned to the Dams and headed back to the car at the Nek.

So how had the socks done? Well once back on the concrete road and running like a Machine I can tell you that the socks had held up well after almost 2 hours of running and most of it in the wet... they weren't falling down or crunching up at the toes so I guess I'll be wearing them again when I'm on the mountain splashing through the rain. I still think they might be a bit thick and hence warm for summer, but only time will tell.

PS was also wearing a pair last night (don't know if all 3 pairs are the same) but I had a different shoe on, and this shoe hold water a little bit more than the Rockridge, and I felt that the socks got a bit heavy once I had run through a river...