AN ‘ELATED’ Lutterworth woman has proved ‘anything is possible’ after finally completing her 25-year mission to become an elite marathon runner at the age of 61.
Zelda Taylor ran her first 34.8mile Two Oceans Ultra Marathon in Cape Town – known as the world’s most beautiful Marathon – at the age of 35 back in 1999, when she was still living in South Africa.
Now she has overcome a number of challenges to complete her tenth marathon – her ‘ulitimate goal’ – joining the elite ranks of runners due to the difficulty and cut-off time.
When she arrived in the UK in 2018, Zelda was well on track to achieve her ambition, having just completed her eighth race.
She said: “I joined the Lutterworth Rotary club shortly after we arrived. They were a great source of encouragement in so many ways and helped me tremendously to settle and integrate into the community.
“When they found out that I was going to go and run the Ultra Marathon they were very encouraging – even though a number of them thought I was absolutely mad to embark on this journey.
“The race is run April which makes training easy in South Africa as most of the training is done during the summer months – but I found it very difficult to train in the UK
“It took a lot of determination and perseverance to train through the cold, wet and dark winter months, as I was not used to this climate at all.
“Nevertheless I managed to get the required milage done and went off to South Africa, and managed to complete my ninth Two Oceans in 2019, the number 10 now within my reach.”
She continued her training the following year and was on course to complete her 10th race – but then the pandemic put a stop to everything.
She decided to give it another go in mid 2023, and got back up to speed.
But during her final stretch of training, she felt abdominal discomfort and couldn’t continue.
A visit to the doctor revealed she had a bi-lateral inguinal hernia.
She said: “I was devastated and couldn’t believe that all my efforts were in vain.
“But after speaking to a surgeon and explaining what I was training for, he said go and run, your body will tell you if you can’t, come back to tell me all about it before we do surgery.
“I felt elated because I got the green light from him, but had to lay off training until I got to South Africa three days before race day.”
She went for a short six-mile run in Cape Town the day before the race, and decided to go to the start and see how she felt on the day.
“The atmosphere, excitement, and nerves at the start was so exhilarating and the crowd support along the route is amazing, and this pulls you through,” she said.
“I felt fine up to the 17.4 mile point, which is where I thought I might have to call it a day.
“I decided to continue even though I knew this is really where the race starts, because you start climbing at least 931 meters and finally descend 879 meters to the finish.
“Fatigued and with some abdominal discomfort, I managed to push through.”
She made the cut-off time to to qualify for a bronze medal with just over two minutes to spare – earning her elite status and coveted permanent Blue Number.
“It took every ounce of my being to finish, and I am very grateful that I managed it,” she said.
“Thank you to everyone who has encouraged and supported me along this journey.
“I have decided to put the ultra long distances to bed now and will focus on half marathons in the future. I will continue running for as long as I am able.
“My motto is anything is possible, and never give up on you goals and dreams.”
