From a heart scare, to conquering one of the world’s toughest ultra-marathons

Every Saturday, while much of Auckland is still asleep, Terrance Nota is out running.

At 2:30am, the 1M Service Technician [MJ1] is awake and preparing for another long training session. By 3am, he’s out the door with a head torch, running hills through the dark before most people have started their day.

There’s no music in his headphones, and usually nobody running alongside him. Just his thoughts, cool air and steep trails. Every kilometre he knocks off, he’s another step towards one of the world’s toughest endurance races.

This week, Terrance is travelling to South Africa to compete in the Comrades Marathon – an 85km ultramarathon between Durban and Pietermaritzburg that climbs to 2,000 metres uphill. It will be the third time he has taken on the race.

It’s hard to believe, but just a few years ago, the South African-born man weighed more than 100 kilograms and even suffered a minor heart attack.

“I had never been for a run in my life,” he says. “When I went for a health check-up after my heart attack, they found my BMI was very high. I needed to make some lifestyle changes, and that was my motivation to take up running.”

At first, his running goal was simply to improve his health so he could be a better husband and father. Then his boss at the time scoffed at him, saying he would never complete a marathon.

“I’m the type of person who, if you tell me I can’t do something, I always want to prove that I’m capable of doing it,” Terrance says with a smile. “So that man unwittingly provided extra motivation!”

Today, running has become an integral part of his life.

Each morning before work, he trains, running between 10 and 15km. On weekends, he completes his longest runs before the rest of the household wakes up so he can still spend time with his family afterwards.

“That gives me enough time that when the family wakes up, I’m home and able to step in – I drop my wife off at work, and I’m around to be a father at home,” he says.

Terrance moved to Aotearoa New Zealand from South Africa three and a half years ago with his wife and three children, looking for a safer future for his family.

“It was mostly for the future of the kids,” he says. “I was honestly scared for them.”

Despite the solitary nature of Terrance’s chosen sport, he says that it’s people who provide his strongest sporting memories.

Recently, during the Rotorua marathon, Terrance noticed a younger runner struggling and close to giving up. He stayed beside him for the remainder of the race, encouraging him through to the finish line.

His favourite memory, though, was from his first Comrades Marathon.

After seeing the steep climbs ahead of the race, Terrance became convinced he wouldn’t be able to finish – he thought he’d bitten off more than he could chew. Back in his hotel room, he started writing a message to his wife explaining why he was going to pull out.

What he didn’t know was that she had secretly organised flights with help from family and friends and travelled to South Africa to surprise him.

“She got my message while standing in the hotel lobby,” he says. “I think that’s what actually made me able to finish it the first time – knowing how much faith she has in me.”

Byron Keppler, Head of Maintenance at 1M, says the same consistency Terrance applies to running is reflected in the way he approaches work.

“Terrance never talks himself up, but you quickly realise the level of commitment behind what he’s doing,” Byron says.

“He approaches work the same way he approaches training – prepared, dependable and willing to keep going when things get tough. That consistency earns a lot of respect from the people around him.”

Terrance is flying to Durban this week to acclimatise before race day on Sunday, 14 June.

This year, he is aiming to complete the race in under 11 hours – there are strict cut-off times for the ‘UP RUN’, and he needs to complete the race in under 12 hours. And, in case you’re wondering how far ‘up hill’ a 2000m climb is – for comparison, Auckland sits a mere 32m above sea level…

Best of luck Terrance, we’ll be cheering you on!