Spartan Harriers’ legend Boet van Zyl, 80, clocked a whopping 30 000km when he reached the 4km mark of the Bay to Bay Race earlier this year.
Van Zyl joined Spartans in 1977, making him one of the longest standing members of the club. The members fondly call him “Boet, our legend”.
As a young man he started documenting all the races in which he participated and on Sunday January 22, at the 4km mark of the Bay to Bay Race, he reached his 30 000km milestone, which includes 13 Comrades, 28 Two Oceans Ultras and 10 Two Oceans Half Marathons.
If you think about it, Boet would have covered the distance from Cape Town to London and back with about 4000km (about the width of the United States) to spare.
Boet encouraged many runners through the years and understandably, he has cut back on his mileage nowadays, preferring to run a park run every Saturday accompanied by his son, Gary. To date Boet has completed 298 park runs.
