If there’s anyone who knows all about February being the month of love it’s newly crowned SA marathon road running champion Landie Greyling.
Just two days after Valentine’s Day last week, Greyling won the senior women’s title in a championship run in conjunction with the popular Peninsula Marathon in Cape Town — in a time of 2hr 55 min 01 sec.
She actually finished third woman behind Nedbank’s Jenna Challenor and Deanne Laubscher, but both were ineligible for the title as they were not running in provincial colours like Greyling, who is grateful to have been selected by Western Province.
Surprisingly, Greyling, at 41, is still finding her feet in the road running scene, having first excelled at adventure racing and then trail running.
But let’s get back to how fabulous February has been throughout Greyling’s life.
“It really is a significant month,” she explains. “My hubby [Christiaan] and I were married on 4/2/12, then on 14/2/18 I discovered I was pregnant with our son Christopher.
“Also, our daughter Anzel was born on 5/2/21.”
And the February theme also flows into her running success.
“Last year, my first ever road marathon was the Cango Caves Marathon in February, which I won, and then obviously this year’s Peninsula Marathon and the SA title!”
Greyling grew up on a bushveld farm near Cullinan, just east of Pretoria, and in terms of an occupation she had her sights firmly set on being a game ranger in the Kruger National Park.
But she ended up shooting other lights out, in both an academic and sporting sense.
She matriculated with four distinctions and went on to study accounting at Tuks, do her articles and go on to get her master’s in tax, though bizarre as it may seem she’s never actually worked full-time as a chartered accountant. Instead, she has for the most part lectured and worked part-time.
When it comes to her adventure and trail running career, there quite simply wouldn’t be enough space to list all her achievements.
“I eventually competed full-time from 2014 and raced a lot internationally, with many stints in Europe. I came fourth twice in the Mont Blanc marathon and also in the Mont Blanc 90km. One of my ultimate highlights was when myself and Christiaan [an industrial engineer by trade] finished second in the eight-day Transalpine Epic stage race in Switzerland.”
She also won events like the Ultra Trail Pyrenees and the Buffalo Stampede in Australia, and before that represented SA on two occasions in the World Mountain Running Championships over the short and long distance courses (2012/2013), and then again in 2023 when she was already a mom.
In 2017 she picked up her first running injury (in her ankle) and thoughts turned to starting a family as she was by then 34.
“We were busy planning another mission to run through Lesotho over a period of 10 days — about 500km but with huge elevation — and then of course I discovered I was pregnant in February 2018.”
She had big racing plans for 2020 but then Covid-19 hit and everything fell apart — aside from her family, which grew to four with the arrival of daughter Anzel in February 2021.
“The next year turned out to be a breakthrough year when I started training with Ernie Gruhn [former coach of SA superstar Olympian Elana Meyer) in Stellenbosch, who helped a lot with my speed. I won seven of my eight trail races, including the Ultra Trail Cape Town 55km.”
And the next year was another busy one with the Greylings’ Alpasfit online coaching business. The word is “Filipino” and it translates to breaking free from the old into the new. They work on changing roughly 100 people’s lives through this coaching tool.
It was Gruhn who persuaded Greyling that if she wanted to focus on road running then she may as well do the Comrades Marathon, the holy grail of SA road running.
“Before I knew it I won the Cango Caves marathon in 2:51 and was surprised at what an enjoyable experience it was.
“Then I used Two Oceans as a training event and paced myself conservatively to a time of 4hr 10 min. I ran a few more marathons and then finished Comrades in 6hr 40 min to place 16th woman. I wanted to run 6:45 so was very happy, and with it being a very competitive year in the women’s field my time would have been worth a top 10 in many other years.”
On to her latest achievement of being national marathon champion… Greyling doesn’t shy away from the travails of being a full-time runner.
“The start of this year was very challenging, with Christiaan starting a new job, my son starting grade 1, and me trying to be there for everyone. Thankfully my mom came down from Gauteng to help us this month, which made such a difference, and Christiaan, as an athlete himself, is an absolute rock.
“A lot of people only see the glorious side of trail running, running free in the mountains, but behind the scenes there are many disappointments with sponsorships that don’t materialise and getting up for early morning training runs in tough weather, over weekends and holidays.
“It’s not about just running when you feel like it. It’s been a very long journey and it’s natural to question if you’re on the right path.”
Thankfully, she does have a few loyal sponsors on board in the shape of Puma, Bootlegger, Biogen, ButtaNut and her club sponsors, Nedbank Running.
“I went into Peninsula just looking for a Two Oceans/Comrades qualifier but the Lord always has interesting and unique ways of getting a message across and Sunday was clearly meant to be a good day ... finishing third and somehow getting to be national champion was an extra boost and such an affirmation at this stage of my career.
“I really hope that this will show my own kids and others that a life of discipline and hard effort makes a difference, and instil good things in them.”
Next up is Two Oceans in early April “and I’m more fired up than ever to get a good result and build it up to Comrades and see how a ‘down’ run goes”.
Whatever happens along the road for the big-hearted little SA champion, she’ll always remember February fondly throughout her running and personal life — the month of love.
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