Do you love running on your Adelaide Park Lands trails?
Some people love it more than others. At one end of the scale are the short courses made popular by the regular Wednesday Corporate Cup and Saturday morning Park Run organisers.
Start of the 24-hour run. Pic: Karina Cook
At the other end of the scale, there are some dedicated "ultra" runners who train for events much longer: a six-hour, 12-hour, or even a 24-hour event running around a Park Lands loop.
Emma MacIntosh. Photo: Lachlan Miller
On 11 July, the 11th annual Adelaide 24-hour race was held on the unsealed University loop - a 2.2km dirt track circuit around Bullrush Park /Warnpangga (Park 10).
Pic: Karina Cook
The route is well used by runners every day but on 11 July it was the venue for extraordinary feats of endurance.
Sonja Jansen receiving her winner’s trophy after 24 hours of running. Pic: Ted Jennings
The event was won by Sonja Jansen who completed 106 laps of the track (233.2 kilometres) in 24 hours. David Billet was first male completing 82 laps (182.1 kilometres)..
Tamas Lorincz finished third with 79 laps (174.7 kilometres)
Tamas Lorincz just after finishing. Pic: Ted Jennings
Tamas told APA's Ted Jennings that he had "not really trained" for this event, but nevertheless achieved his goal of covering more than 100 miles (160 km) within the 24 hours.
Tamas hardly needed to train specifically for a 24-hour run, because only three weeks earlier he had done something even more gruelling - running 320 km from Murray Bridge to Tailem Bend in 53 hours.
Tamas was born in Hungary and has lived all over the world, settling in Australia after meeting his wife. Taking up running at 40 he thought would be an "efficient way" to exercise as a new parent.
Pic: Karina Cook
For those wo don't aspire to such feats of endurance, there are plenty of shorter, scenic running loops available within your Adelaide Park Lands, some courses crossing over the river at various points such as the weir, or the Albert Bridge at Frome Rd. See maps of the various routes at this site:
https://explore.cityofadelaide.com.au/see-and-do/parks-gardens/fitness-trails-ma/
