Meet 'The Man With The Rope'
South Africa's Thomas van Tonder – a guy who just climbed 90-metres up a rope as an official Guinness World Record - spoke to Sky Tshabalala about this amazing and yet rare feat.
There are hundreds of disciplines of sport in the world and while many of us are familiar with quite a number of them - thanks to the media - there are other disciplines we may have never thought existed.
Thomas Van Tonder, a Red Bull Obstacle Course Racing (OCR) Athlete, achieved his goal of a 90m rope climb between one of Joburg’s most iconic landmarks, the Soweto Towers - breaking the Guinness World Record.
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Sky Tshabalala was intrigued by this achievement and wanted to know all about it. So he got ahold of the man he refers to as 'The Man With The Rope' - who nailed the climb in 09:05 - to find out exactly what goes into planning and training for such a a sport.
The father of one is probably the first athlete with this title in South Africa, but he admits that the most popularly known title or brand is known as 'The Warrior Race'. Back in 2014 when he started this form of obstacle racing, he finished in second place and never looked back.
Lots of strategising, training, and commitment formed part of helping the obstacle course racing athlete, Van Tonder achieved his goal of summiting the 90m rope at Joburg’s most iconic landmarks, the Soweto Towers.
"The preparation for this thing has been extremely unique. It is a very odd thing. Training specifically for a rope climb this long and this fast has been really hard. Initially, the aim was to climb the whole thing, but the Guinness World Record attempt that came into this wasn't the initial thought but that became the main focus in the end," van Tonder says.
For the full interview, listen below:
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IMAGE CREDIT: Instagram/Thomas-ocr