006: Comrades 2025 - The first cut is the deepest.

It is Race Week: Comrades 2025, #isiko_mpilo, is upon us. For the last four years, this race has been a highlight of my year. The story doesn't begin with my first run in 2022, though.

This is the third of five essays that I'll be sharing this week about my relationship with The Ultimate Human Race. This essay – the longest in the series (the "real ones" will stick with me through this one) – covers the build up to and day of my first Comrades in 2022. Standing on the start line in Pietermaritzburg for the first time left an indelible mark on me. Every moment of that day is etched into my memory and I hope that this essay captures some of the emotions that I experienced. Rod Stewart said it best when he sang “The first cut is the deepest…”

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March to July

After qualifying for Comrades at the Johnson Crane Hire Marathon in March and subsequently entering the Big C, I had to formulate a plan to get me to race day – healthy and whole.

The first port-of-call was to find a club.  For Comrades I needed to find a tribe, since, as the African proverb goes, "If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together." I had run for the Momentum Outdoor+ club, because it was the cheapest running club that I could find after Running Inn had disbanded and I had cancelled my Team Vitality membership due to too much Vitality admin (I don't need a smoothie every week to convince me to move, thank you very much). I found Green Mile purely by chance. They had moved to a clubhouse 500m from my house and I met some of the members on the Time Trial route and promptly decided to sign up. GMAC has been a wonderful running home and it is a wonderful example that the best people tend to stumble across your path.

Club sorted, next up was a training plan. I wouldn't be using a coach because a.) I am cheap and b.) I wanted to figure it out myself. The common target to aim for in terms of mileage in the 5 months before Comrades, is 1000km, or 200km per month. The idea is to slowly build the mileage, reach peak fitness and fatigue 3 to 4 weeks before race day and taper off your efforts to arrive at race day with fresh legs and mentally able to carpe diem. You also need to sprinkle in a few marathons and at least one ultra distance event of at least 50km. This formula increases the faster you wish to go, but for my first one, survival was the goal. Having already run Johnson Crane, I entered the Wally Hayward on 1 May and surprised myself by running a 19 minute PB in 4:00:34 and almost breaking 4 hours.

I then worked my way towards the Om die Dam 50km in Hartbeespoort where the goal was simply to get through the distance, no matter how slowly. To this day, I haven’t run a harder 50km and was mentally broken by the last hill up to Hartbeespoort High School. It felt horrific on the day, but it was a proper foreshadowing of the challenges that lay ahead at Comrades. The only redeeming factor about Om die Dam is that you get little milk tarts at the NG Kerk at 42km. I can still recall the goosebumps from the first bite.

Considering my Novice status at Big C, I didn’t really understand how to put together a training plan and ended up tapering for quite long before Comrades – a full 4 weeks. I had done 1070km in the five months and was definitely not overtrained, but perhaps a few long runs short of optimal fitness. Most importantly, I was healthy and excited to take on the day.

Travelling to KZN

I was privileged to drive down to KZN for my first Comrades with two very experienced Comrades runners – Hannelie Duvenage (8 Comrades) and Louis Dey (18 Comrades). We had another aspiring Comrades athlete – Jurgens Laas – as our chauffeur for the weekend. We set off to Comrades House in Pietermaritzburg on Friday, 26 August 2022, full of excitement. Hannelie was ready to get to 10 Comrades finishes.

Side bar -  With Comrades, you always receive the same race number. After 10 finishes, you get a Green Number – which means that your number is never recycled and given to another runner if you miss a few years. It is then yours forever and if you have family or friends who want to follow in your footsteps, you can let them run in your number. I looked into the possibility of requesting my dad’s number – 24434 – but discovered that it had been giving to Philani Nzimande, who made it Green in 2024. I actually met the man on the route in 2024 and found him to be an unbelievably worthy person to don the same number as my dad. Now, I’ll just have to make my number – 52455 – a Green one. Only 7 more to go!

Louis is a Comrades veteran who once ran the first 75km so fast that he could afford to walk the last 15km and still finish under 9 hours. He knows how to get it done. On this day, though, he had come down with an Upper Respiratory Tract Infection (URTI) and wasn’t feeling particularly buoyant as we made our way down the N3. His raspy bass voice deteriorated into a growl and eventually a whisper by the time we got to Comrades House to collect our race numbers. We collected our numbers and did a quick tour of the house that stands as a shrine to the history of the race. Rooms are filled with memorabilia from past winners and you stand in awe of the early Comrades runners who took on the challenge wearing what we would call “work boots” nowadays.

After a few pictures, we drove down to Kingsborough, where Hannelie's family has a flat. We stayed there on the Friday night and Sunday after the race. We would be driving back up to the Midlands for accommodation closer to the race start on Saturday. We first had a steak dinner and a compulsory beer before we settled in for an early night and some strange dreams of running long distances.

On Saturday morning, we got up for breakfast at a local surf shack and watched the Springboks lose 17-25 to the Wallabies in one of the worst Springbok performances that I ever saw. Louis already obliterated vocal chords gave up the ghost after an error-strewn performance from the boys in Green and Gold. We were soon on our way to our accommodation just outside Nottingham Road and arrived around 14:00 ready to prep our gear for the next day, have an early dinner in Notties and then get to bed in the quiet of the Midlands. Idyllic.

When packing for Comrades, it is important to check that you pack the right shoes. It sounds like an obvious piece of advice, but one that can catch out even the most experienced runner. Not long after arriving I heard a scurrying in the room next to mine. Louis had packed two left footed shoes – his weekend was going from bad to worse. There was enough time to drive to PMB and catch the local Sportsmans Warehouse before closing time and get a new pair of shoes. What transpired was a 3 hour roundtrip for him and Hannelie as they had to go all the way to Hillcrest to find an open shop. By the time that they were coming back to the accommodation, we had missed our dinner reservation and Jurgens and I were getting pretty peckish. The best that they could do, was buy a big bucket of KFC and a plethora of sides. We ate this next to a raging bonfire and went to bed a bit later and oilier than planned.

To the startline

Waking up at 01:45 to get to the Comrades race start felt like a surreal dream. It was made even more so by a thick fog that had settled on the Midlands over night. On the drive, I reflected on my three goals for the day. Firstly, I wanted to run a sub-11 Comrades and get a Bronze medal. When my dad finished the Comrades 7 times in the 1990’s, the final cut-off was at 11 hours. In 2000, the year of my dad’s last Comrades, the cut-off was extended to 12 hours. I felt a sense of family pride in seeing 11 hours as the cut-off. Secondly, I wanted to beat my dad’s first Down run time from his first Comrades down run in 1991. He had finished in 10:45:36. I felt that by chasing this goal, it would give me just enough of a buffer under 11 hours to reach my first goal comfortably. I had printed and laminated a pacing chart for 10:25:00 to give me as much chance as possible to make 10:45:00 a possibility and was planning to stick to that plan for as long as I could.

Finally, I had one last audacious goal to run the last 3km at full tilt. In my preparations, I had looked at the entire Comrades route on Google Street View, to get a sense of what the large milestones on the route look like. When rounding the corner at Kingsmead Cricket Stadium, there is approximately 2.6km left to the finish at Moses Mabhida Stadium. As I walked through the course on Street View, I imagined coming round that corner, turning up the pace and feeling stronger with every step. As many motivational speakers say: “If you can visualise, it will materialise."

I wanted to achieve these three things while repeating two mantras in my mind. The first was “You can do hard things”. I was running the Comrades. No explanation needed. The second was “Just. Stay. Calm”. It was going to be a long day and regulating any excitement was key to having a good day.

As we drove into PMB, I imagined that final corner while reciting my two mantras. We did a quick pit stop, made a final check of all our goodies and then Jurgens dropped us off. Suddenly, we were walking through the streets of PMB with other nervous runners. With every step, things were getting more and more real.

At the crowing of the cockerel, you run

As you near the street in which the race starts, runners are split into their starting batches. You are sorted into an alphabetical seeding batch based on your fastest qualifying marathon. I had run a 04:00:34 at the Wally Hayward Marathon and missed out on a D batch seeding by 35 seconds. Since the E batch is reserved for Comrades veterans who have Green numbers, I was sorted into the F batch. I split from Louis and Hannelie and reported in the F batch on my own. WhileGreen Mile had 41 runners at Comrades and I knew many other runners on the day, I enjoyed having the start all to myself. It was a cool morning and I enjoyed looking at all the people. Comrades runners wear two race bibs – one at the front and one on your back – that have your name, starting batch, race number and number of Comrades medals on them. Veterans were supplying novices with last bits of advice and old friends were catching up after not having run a Comrades since 2019. I could see the different “bus drivers” and was feeling immense respect for other runners who had put up banners to commemorate loved ones and other worthy causes.

Comrades is all about tradition and there is a pre-run sequence of events that ratchets up the excitement levels. They first played the national anthem. I sang loudly, but remembering to “Just. Stay. Calm.”. After the national anthem, the barriers between batches are dropped, which allows the runners to fill up the gaps between batches by walking forward. As we started walking, Shosholoza rang out. After what felt like the millionth repeat, Chariots of Fire started playing. A journey that had started with my dad’s example, journeyed through my long and slow build-up to becoming a marathoner, the months of focusing on the goal and staying strong, culminated in this one moment. I had the largest cry I had had in a long, long time. I eventually calmed down, wiped my tears and settled myself as the song ended. There truly is nothing like standing on your first Comrades start line. It is a life-defining experience.

Finally, Max Trimborn’s cockerel crowed twice. Shots were fired and we were officially racing.

From PMB to Harrison Flats (0-33km)

One of the challenges of starting in the F batch, is that it takes a fair bit of time to cross the start line. As the gun went off, I could just see heads bobbing far ahead and after a minute or two, the F batch started walking. It took me 3 minutes and 25 seconds to cross the line and start running. I gave one last look up at the PMB City Hall clock tower and set off at an easy 7:00/km pace. Unlike other races, the Comrades has its distance markers count down instead of up. The first distance marker I saw, was the one that said 88km to go. I thought to myself: “That is a MASSIVE number.” In the spirit of keeping calm, I laughed and kept going. I met Michael Strydom - a fellow Green Miler - and had a quick chat with him. Michael had had a tumultuous build-up, but was looking great and in high spirits as he was aiming to get his fifth Comrades medal. He was aiming to finish in 12 hours, so I set off and I caught up to Louis and Hannelie as we were running out of PMB and dawn was breaking. Louis was looking much better than the previous day, but was non-committal when I asked how he felt. Luckily his new shoes were comfortable.

I then picked up the pace a little bit more to catch up to my goal pace for the first 5km. As I took out my pacing chart, a Durban runner came past and said: “You can throw that thing away, bru.” I gave a nervous laugh, but checked my pace regardless. Shortly after, we reached the top of Polly Shortts – the first of the Big 5 Comrades hills. On the Up run, it is a harrowing, long climb that you reach at 80km. On the Down run, you run down the “long side” of the hill. It was my first experience of the hill and as many runners picked up the pace, I was very aware of keeping the pace down.

Shortly after running up Little Polly’s into the town of Ashburton, I saw Barry Holland. He is a Comrades legend who had run 47 Comrades. I was in awe to see the man with the most Comrades finishes in real life. I pointed him out to a man named Duncan and we had a lovely conversation as he told me about his family who now lives in Sweden and his experiences of running ultramarathons in the Scandinavian winters. Suddenly, 2km had passed, but I was starting to feel a bit shaky. I looked at my pacing chart and saw that I was going a bit too fast. I bid Duncan adieu and decided to walk through the bad patch and refresh with a sandwich and some water. Most of my buffer to the 10:25:00 plan was wiped out by the bad patch and I felt a bit nervous that I had fallen behind so quickly. The nerves were not helped by the seemingly never-ending drag up to Umlaas Road – the highest point on the course.

I dug in for my first trip into the pain cave and came out of it just as I entered Camperdown, which is traditionally the first place on the route where you meet large crowds. Even at 8:00 in the morning, the braais were lit and the beers were flowing. KZN was clearly in the mood to celebrate the three year Covid-enforced Comrades hiatus in a big way. I was enjoying the crowds so much that I was shocked to suddenly Louis appear in front of me. He had made a Lazarus-like recovery and was running strongly in front of me. So much so that I almost felt like I had to stretch myself to keep up. I ran with him and Hannelie through Camperdown and eventually dropped them in the rolling hill section that borders the N3 on the way to Cato Ridge. This was truly the best running I experienced all day. The gears were well oiled and I was settling into a very nice groove of cruising on the downhills and taking it easy on the uphills.

Life was very good as I entered Cato Ridge to the roar of more large, enthusiastic crowds. Many experts will tell you to break Comrades into a race of three 30km sections. In the words of Barry Holland, “you run the first two with your body and the last one with your heart”. In order to get into the shape of being able to push through the last third, I had to run conservatively in the first third. I wasn’t on Plan A anymore, but I was still very far from falling into the clutches of the 11 hour buses. The second third, however, promised to be much tougher. The heat of Harrison Flats, and the murderous climbs of Inchanga and Drummond loomed large and I was still 30km away from the proper start of the “Down” run. I repeated my mantra, “I can do hard things” and cruised through Cato Ridge, steeling myself for the second third of the race.

Harrison Flats to Botha’s Hill (34-52km)

Running out of Cato Ridge, I ate two potatoes and drank a small glass of Rehidrat after which I was hit by an immense wave of nausea. It wasn’t long after that when a runner pulled to the side of the road and projectile vomited in the most spectacular fashion. Bits splattered on the hot tar road and my stomach took a turn for the worse. As we passed a crematorium, I thought to myself, “Not a bad time to check myself in there. This is tough.”

In order to prevent the debilitating cramps of the runner’s trots, I had taken two Immodiums before the race. The bottom exit was shored up, but for the first time in my life, I was hit by nausea while running. I didn’t know what to do. On my pacing charts, I had mapped out exactly when to eat what. As the sun baked down on us in the Harrison Flats, with large police horses walking with a clippity-clop rhythm beside the road, I perused my pacing chart and considered my options. The mere thought of eating anything on the chart was enough to bring me very close to following the other runner’s example. I decided to simply keep hydrating with Coke and water, keep the food intake to a minimum and wait for things to get better.

As the nausea ebbed and flowed, I had a moment to stop feeling sorry for myself as we passed the Ethembeni Special school for disabled children. Their cheers are worth an extra 30 seconds for the next kilometre, which is just enough to get you started with Inchanga hill before you realise that you are now on the back of one of the Big 5 hills on the route. On Inchanga, I decided to employ what I like to call the “Mazda” technique. You run tree-to-tree. For three kilometres, I ran-walked with metronomic efficiency. I also distracted myself by looking for a flower to put at Arthur’s seat just after halfway. Arthur’s Seat is an indentation in a rock where Comrades legend used to sit on his training runs and survey the Valley of a Thousand Hills while taking a medicinal smoking pipe. Legend has it that if you put a flower at the Seat and greet him with a “Morning, Arthur”, he’ll bless you with a good second half of the race. I was willing to take my chances as I was cresting Inchanga and starting the descent into Drummond, when my next bad patch started.

The humidity was quite intense and there was not a single breath of wind. “Just stay calm”, I reminded myself and soldiered on, taking care not to disrespect the long, sloping downhill.

The low point of my race soon followed about 1km from the halfway point at Drummond. There was a runner lying next to the road. His shoes were off and there were three people standing around him, giving him vigorous CPR. In the end, the runner passed away. He and another runner who collapsed in Pinetown were the first Comrades fatalities on the road since 2012. Seeing that put a massive damper on the experience of running into the festival that is Drummond – a place where I had had my first Comrades experience in the womb of my mother in 1992. As I was approaching the massive purple Hollywoodbets signage, a runner collapsed right next to me. My heart skipped a beat and I thought, “Surely not another?!”. Luckily, the runner had simply been enamoured with the excitement and tripped over his own two feet. I helped him up and he gathered himself with large eyes and sent me on my way with a friendly wave.

Halfway. Done. Right after halfway, as you climb out of Drummond, an eerie silence descends over l the runners. At that moment everyone is having an inner dialogue that goes something like this: “Yes, that’s halfway, but I’m flippen sore. How the heck am I going to do all of that again?” Before you can get too philosophical, however, you need to grit your teeth and negotiate one of the toughest sections of the Down Run.

The 8km section after halfway is a series of four nasty climbs interspersed with flat and downhill sections that make you think that you’ve finally started the Down Run. This section does, luckily, also hold two of the route highlights. First, there is Arthur’s Seat, but in the shock of seeing the runner next to the road and processing my inner monologue, I completely missed it. Next came the Wall of Honour where anyone that has finished a Comrades can buy a plaque with their name and race number to commemorate their triumph over the Ultimate Human Race. I imagined putting my name there along with my dad’s number and soldiered on.

In all this excitement, my nausea started to subside a little, running became a bit easier and I noticed that I was passing lots of runners while walking. With my wild arm swinging walk, I passed three Green Number legends from Green Mile – Chris and Isabel Koch and Belinda Henze - up one of the steep climbs. They had 21, 14 and 11 Comrades medals, respectively. I felt strong and I felt emboldened by their words of encouragement. As I walked past them and sped up down a hill, Isabel gave a nervous call: “Be careful! Don’t go too fast down the hills.” I felt my heart swell with affection for my club mates who were invaluable in preparation for the big day. I smiled and kept going.

The next hill, however, my mood soured as we ascended the final climb up Botha’s Hill. The only thing that kept going through my mind was “can we please just start running downhill?!” My heart rate was also getting really high in the heat and I was yearning for some shade. Despite feeling stronger, I still hadn’t eaten anything for almost 20km. I knew I was starting to play a dangerous game.

When you finally crest Botha’s Hill, you run past Kearsney College. All the school boys are there in their school clothes and make a massive amount of noise with school war cries and general well wishes. Once you hear the Kearsney cheers, you know the Down Run has finally begun. To celebrate the milestone, I gave a schoolboy a massive high five and looked up gratefully to the old trees that line the streets and have shielded countless runners with their leafy canopies. I also noticed that the clouds were starting to roll in from the coast. Knowing that about 38km still waited, I put my head down and aimed for the next milestone: the club gazebo in Kloof, on 63km and then, down Field’s Hill, through Pinetown to Cowie's Hill.

Botha’s Hill to Cowie’s Hill (52-73km)

Finally running downhill, I enjoyed running into Hillcrest, where the crowd volume ratchets up to a whole new level. It is here where you realise what a massively big deal Comrades is to the KZN community. I was getting really worried about my continued lack of calories, though. Another wave of nausea hit me and suddenly Hannelie appeared next to me, running strongly on the gentle downhill. She is never the most talkative runner, but could see that I was in a bad way. As we cruised to Kloof on the 11 hour bus that had caught me up Botha’s Hill, she told wonderful running stories. All that I can remember is saying, “ja”, “wow” and “umph” as we approached Field’s Hill. In this patch, I at least found that I could drink small cans of alcohol free beer and had taken two in quick succession. I blew right past the club gazebo – just wanting the misery to end. As we went down Field’s Hill, the 11 hour bus pulled away from me with Hannelie going with them. I was all alone at a waterpoint  halfway down Field’s and experienced, for the first time, my "spirit leaving my body" during a run.

"Just. Stay. Calm.”, I repeated and assessed the situation. I dove into an ice bucket with my Buff and cooled myself down with the icy water. “I am going to be on that bus by the time I get to Pinetown”, I said, gritted my teeth and set off in hot pursuit. As you turn off the M13 highway into Pinetown, there is a slight incline where the bus started to walk and I caught them, feeling good, with the effect of the beer starting to revitalise me. Hannelie and I decided to beat the crowd and run ahead of the bus through Pinetown.

The final Big 5 hill, Cowie’s Hill, waits at the end of Pinetown and as I walked strongly up it, I saw many runners doubled over with cramp. At the top, just after the vibey Thirsti aid station, a runner from Meyerton AC was lying in the dust, delirious with dehydration, doing freestyle swimming in the dust. I looked at Hannelie and she offered me a pain pill. Being a doctor, I trusted her and promptly downed two. They kicked in almost immediately as I soared down the back of Cowie’s into Westville.

Cowie’s Hill to Berea (73 - 86km)

Depsite my newfound vigour going downhill, running uphill had become impossible. I committed to running the downhills as fast I could and walk every single incline for the rest of the way. My watch had died just after Cowie’s so I had no idea how fast I was going, but knew that I would be OK if I just stayed ahead of the 11 hour bus. By focusing on the distance markers, and counting them down into single digits, the 11 hour bus and Hannelie started to get smaller as I looked back on every uphill. Suddenly, I was walking up 45th Cutting, grabbing some boerewors from a supporter and powering down the highway towards Durban as the clouds started to darken the skies. Then, I crested the highway overpass in Berea into Durban and I could see the finish - Moses Mabhida stadium and its twinkling lights - for the first time. I was almost there.

As I settled in for the last 5km, two girls passed me with worried expressions. One said to the other, “I think the 11 hour bus is going to catch us.” Wary of looking around and freezing like Loth’s wife, I recalled my third goal for the day – to run the last 3km as fast as I could. We were still 5km away, but I didn’t work as hard as I did from Cowie’s just to be caught by the bus again. “They’ll have to scrape me from the road with a putty knife before that bus catches me”, I said to myself and used the downhill to catapult me into Durban.

As I rounded the corner at Kingsmead, I realised that I was living inside the picture that I had visualised before the race. I flew past many runners who had decided to walk the last 2.2km and felt a euphoria that has stayed in my bones to this day. I wish I knew what my pace was, but as I turned into Moses Mabhida stadium, a clock outside the entrance indicated that I had three minutes to beat my dad’s first Down Run time. All my boxes were ticked. I slowed down on the home stretch, to take in the moment. 10:45:06. All I could think, was “What the hell just happened?” I crossed the line, a volunteer put a Bronze medal around my neck, I had a picture taken and I was celebrating on the phone with Nadia – who was following the race at home. As I ended the call, I turned to face the majestic stadium and cried profoundly happy tears. I am a Comrades runner.

The End

The organisers had one last challenge for the runners. Since we finished on the playing area of the stadium, we had to climb stairs to get out of it. Runners were crowding around the railings and pulled themselves up, painstakingly slow. My legs have never been as sore as after that first Comrades.

I shuffled to the Green Mile gazebo – which was located in People’s Park – almost a kilometre away. There I met Louis and we had to walk all the way back to meet Hannelie – who had also managed to finish under 11 hours. She got her Green number in 2023 and has promised to never return to Comrades again. Louis had to withdraw from the race at 56km, with his URTI eventually getting the better of him. He would return for Comrades #19 in 2023 and got his Double Green Number in 2024. It was an unlucky weekend for one of my favourite Ooms, but he is still one of the strongest runners I know who will again toe the line in 2025.

After meeting Jurgens, we set off for Kingsborough, ate a few large pizzas and settled into an easy, well-deserved sleep with the humming of the crowds still ringing in our ears. The next day we started our trek back to Gauteng. Everytime we stopped for a break, we could see other runners doing their “post-Comrades-shuffle” to their cars. We would give them a wave and a nod of the head, as if it so say “I know you’re a Comrades legend”. That is still one of my favourite Comrades traditions.

Back home, Nadia had baked a big batch of my favourite Peanut Butter cookies. I spent the next few days burning through them while reminiscing over the experience and started to make plans for Comrades 2023. Most of the text in this essay was written in 2022 and I am glad to finally share it and revisit one of my favourite ever days. The first cut had been very deep indeed and I couldn’t wait to do it all over again.

The fourth essay in this series covers Comrades 2023 and 2024 and some of the harsh lessons that life had to teach me before getting the privilege to go for a fourth Comrades in 2025.