You have to love the concept. Brilliant. Will we see it locally?

Shhhhh……

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In prep for Ironman I have spoilt myself a little with some new toys. Well, let’s be honest here for just a second, I am being spoilt by my sponsors with new toys for the last racing day of the season.

New kit:

Luma Sports have done up some amazing kit to race in.

New shoes:

Puma have just released the Complete Utopia II, a shoe I am very excited about. Never mind the color that matches…

New nutrition flavor:

Apart from the normal gels and bars I will be using, as well as loads of awesome little pills from Sport-X, I have a new flavor of energy drink I have been playing with.

Blueberry yes yes!

New Suunto:

After Elgin claimed my T6c during Cape Epic, Suunto have come to the party to make sure I don’t overcook the first lap of the bike, and the run…

There is something truly hot on the boil though, and this is all I can say until it arrives at my front door…

I got some new stickers for my wheels and there is rumor that I may actually ride an aero helmet for the race. All in all, I am going to arrive looking like a pro. Ironman athletes are all so aware of what other athletes look like and I may as well employ all scare tactics for the big day out. It’s waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar out there!

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So I am going to stick my neck out there. I wanted to do something cool, and I guess I don’t care if there are 2 or 200 of us, but I want to create a special bus for the Two Oceans Half Marathon. Bus = group of people running together at a determined pace.

Puma are the headline sponsor for the event, and one of my sponsors too. Their focus this year is to run with JOY, to make running a total JOY, so I am going to put together the Bolt JOY bus. I am swopping my sleek aero outfit and heart rate zones for a day to be a part of the masses who finish around 2 hours for the race. We (possibly just me at this point) will depart en masse from the start, with music, lights and vibes. I will be donning the Bolt arms in the picture here:

We’ll have a dedicated photographer (also probably myself but I promise to work on it), a dedicated refreshment stand at the top of the big hill of the day and some great laughs guaranteed on the day.

Joining the Runners World 2 hour bus, we`ll create what the Two Oceans & Puma’s vibe is all about – that the JOY of running is whats important, not the overall time. Yes, some among us want to race for 2 hours, but we may as well have a laugh along the way, listen to some music, pose with the Bolt Arms (will do my best to get a few more sets organised – mail me if you want to wear them) a few times and cheer on the crowds as we go. 2 hours seems an arb number but its a milestone for a lot of runners.

If you are at all keen on this, please drop me a mail on the contact page HERE to let me know you want to be a part of this.

Now copy the page address from this, and send it out on an email, tweet it, put it in your facebook profiles, and lets get the ball rolling on this.

Let’s experience the JOY of running, have some fun and just generally rock out!

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Designed by Puma and Sagem Wireless, the Puma Phone is an “active smartphone,” offering the expected features — like mobile Internet, messaging, GPS localization, video calling, Bluetooth, a 2.8 inch touch screen, a 3.2 megapixel camera with LED flash, music player, and 3G — as well as sport-minded niceties like GPS, a compass, a pedometer, GPS tracker, and stopwatch. Oh, and it’s got a built-in solar cell for charging when you’re out on the trail, at the track, or just relaxing by the pool.

Sweet.

check out the functionality…

I wonder if we`ll get it locally? Stay tuned to find out.

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So you know about Puma’s Love = Football Campaign…

Not? Seen these around town?

naughty naughty.

In support of PUMA’s Love = Football campaign and Valentine’s Day, a video e-card has been created with football “hooligan” fans singing a love song.

You can customize the e-card with a message and email them to your sweetheart for Valentine’s Day. You can also post the e-card to your loved one’s wall on Facebook.

The e-card is available on www.pumahardchorus.com.

Here is the intro screenshot…

This leads you to a group of English men singing “Truly Madly Deeply” to you. It’s very groovy. Some would say revolutionary, but in the end, it all relates to Puma’s Love = Football campaign. Like it? Send it via email or Facebook to a loved one, on one easy screen, which looks like this:

Easy peasy. Now go out there and spread the love…

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PUMA shows its commitment to Africa and the 12 African Football teams it sponsors by altering the PUMA #1 logo for the first time in the company’s history, replacing the iconic PUMA cat with the Africa continent. The new logo was launched at the start of the African Cup of Nations in January.

thank you Puma!

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Brendan Jack is at it…again!

check this out.

So good.

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In their December issue, Runner’s World South Africa has awarded PUMA’s Complete Velosis its Editor’s Choice.

“The Velosis is the top end of PUMA’s latest range of running shoes and, together with the Vectana, has come on extremely effectively. PUMA is now right up there and you may well just surprise yourself at how competitive it has gotten at the top. Neutrally appointed shoe with a lot of cushioning.”

Congratulations to PUMA’s Product Team. This is only the beginning.

via Puma Running

I am currently running in the 2010 Ventis (find pics of the Ltd Edition Color here and here and here) for a few months now, and can see why the award is there, based on what I have felt with the Ventis

This is the best shoe Puma have ever developed for me and the style I run in. I simply can’t wait for my Ironman racing shoes to arrive. They are a lighter, more flexible version of this shoe, and my some chance, they are in my team colors this year.

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Its a bit later than normal, but here goes.

After a few weeks of successful racing I headed up to WP Trials on Friday last week with a bit of hesitance, as I was nursing an upper respiratory tract infection, commonly known as a Stuffy Head. I did not feel great and was going up to see how I went, but not to kill myself. My plan was to work hard in the swim and bike, and coast the run with a hopeful lead.

I knew some of the faster guys were not coming up and this gave me a bit of hope for the day as well.

We lined up on Saturday morning with the usual smack talk and chatter and I got a good spot on the swim line and before we knew it, we were off on our 2 laps. I hung with swim rabbit Emslie for about 300m and then backed off once I saw we had a gap on the group. I merely wanted to limit loss to Emslie but still build a bit of a break to the chasing pack before the bike got going.

My new Orca Alpha suit, boys and girls, is the shiznitz. It felt really amazing in the water, with less restriction on the arms than I have ever felt. I swim with quite straight arms, and the suit didn’t inhibit that for one second. Kudos to Orca, I think first 4 out the water were all in Orca suits.

Onto the bike, and the mission was to sit up till about 5km, then hammer till 30km, then spin into T2. Mission was on the way when at about 5km I passed young Emslie on the bike and motored by, riding hard (there may have been a bit of white foam on the mouth at this point), checking my Suunto to make sure I was keeping it above 170. At 10km, I had 75sec on 2nd place, at 20km, it was 120sec. On leg 3 I thought I heard a puncture and nearly platzed myself, but the faint noise wouldn’t go, even if the tire was staying hard.

At 30km I still had 120sec over Harold chasing, with a foxy Brendan Lowen on his ass like a fly to a vrot carcass in the sun. I could see they were catching as Harold murders the bike, his freakishly sized calves not being supportive for his running agendas. I was pumped full of Whaspgel by this stage and was ready to spin/hammer home, but I felt as if I was riding with someone holding onto my shirt.

The last leg was murder and I couldn’t understand why it seemed so much harder (inspection after the race revealed that the brakes had locked onto my rear wheel a little and it was tough to spin the wheel – hence the extra effort and loss of time in the last 20km) but kept spinning as I wanted to have semi-fresh legs for the run, whereas I knew the two behind were going to hammer all the way into T2.

The official gap was around 30sec into T2, but I set out running lightly up the hill, but not murdering myself. My Puma racers were perfect for the day, no socks, light, no blisters, and YELLOW!

All our flat running was about to pay off. I buried the downhills and the flats, going deep into GP circuits for inspiration. The lead went up to 1:30 by the end of lap 1, 2:30 by the end of lap 2 so that I had the time and space to chill on lap 3 heading home for a well deserved win, sinus and rubbing wheels couldn’t stop me today.

As I came into the finishline I knew that the sickness, the strange bike feeling and the new, much harder run route would add to around 5minutes of extra time, so to come in just over 2 hours was a happy achievement, and proof that these damn ME workouts have paid off, that the calorie counting has paid off, and that a new attitude is paying off.

Thanks to all my sponsors, you make it so much easier. Puma, Orca, Whasp, Suunto, Rockets (worn in the car on the way home for no sore legs the next day), Jack Black Beer (official recovery fuel).

all images credited to Tess

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