[MARATHON #278 / 2nd Elands Marathon / 1 March 2025]
Most people get injured when they run too much, I seem to get injured when I run too little. I had been taking it easy since the Mdantsane Marathon at the beginning of December with nothing longer than 10km and was just doing enough mileage to keep my beer belly in check. Let’s just say I was in a good equilibrium at the beginning of January when all of a sudden, I felt a pain at the top of my hip during my morning 10k.
Of course my immediate reaction was to try and ‘run it out’. After 5 km of steadily escalating agony, I finally breached my pain threshold and walked home. I was convinced it was a stress fracture but it later turned out to be a very badly strained gluteus medius which had detached from the bone (hence feeling like a stress fracture but with more ‘pull’).
As for what caused it, I could find no evidence that the organisers of any of South Africa’s big races were sticking pins into a Running Mann voodoo doll so I would have to conclude the root cause was a big puzzle – or rather a series of big puzzles that I had done over the December break. There is nothing better than letting my OCD run wild with a full day of puzzling on the patio while listening to music (and enjoying a few beers of course). However, the continual contortionist manoeuvres to hunt down the right pieces obviously took their toll on my aging frame and the end result was no marathons (or running) in January or February.
Luckily Dr. Vic Boston gave me a call in the middle of February to find out how I was doing. I said that I was injured and not running and he said to come over and he’ll sort me out. Vic is a legend on the road – he’s run the third most Comrades (46) and, a relative spring chicken at just 65 years old, is best positioned to overtake Barry Holland and Louis Massyn’s record for most Comrades run at some time in the future. Vic is a distinguished naturopath who offers a wide range of services, including structural corrections using kinesiology and osteopathy techniques, acupuncture, acupressure and reflexology.
I popped around to Vic’s practice in Sandringham one Sunday afternoon. Whilst I had been getting treatment elsewhere, it took Vic about two minutes to diagnose my stress fracture as a badly pulled gluteus medius and work his magic. After administering his healing hands he pronounced me “fixed”, said I should go for my first run back on Tuesday and that I would be fine to run a marathon that weekend (Vic suggested I join him at Buffs – which is his regular qualifier). Having not run for the better part of two months, I took a more prudent approach and deferred my comeback marathon by a week.
My decision not to delay the marathon comeback further was made easier as, back in December, Mandla Nxumalo and Beth Block from the Elands Marathon organising team had invited Julian and I to come and run their 2025 event with entry and accommodation sorted. That was an offer I could not refuse and, with a handful of short but pain free runs on my legs, I headed to Mpumalanga knowing that I would start but not whether (or where) I would finish.
You can either register at the Millys petrol station complex outside Machadodorp (just before the N4 split) or at Lowveld Country Club in Mbombela. We chose Millys which was on the drive through, as had several thousand other Gautengers and we joined a long queue of patient runners in the drizzle. It took about an hour to get our numbers (hopefully this can be improved in future years as the line was even longer when we left) but I was kept stimulated by constant social media “you’ve been tagged in a comment” pings on Cape Town Marathon’s breaking news announcement that they’d switched their 2026 race date to the end of May.
READ MORE: Save the Date (An evaluation of Cape Town Marathon’s date change)
Cape Town Marathon has been by far the most popular Comrades qualifier for several years but Elands has grown steadily in finisher numbers and in qualification popularity. In 2024, they had 2,150 finishers and about half (949) used the race as their Comrades qualifier. They were the fourth largest Comrades qualifier in 2024 (narrowly behind Two Oceans and Kaapsehoop). In 2025 they increased their finisher numbers to 3,279 and, with Cape Town Marathon moving out of Comrades’ friendzone, I predict Elands will be the most popular Comrades qualifier in 2026.
READ MORE: Comrades 2024 Full Field Stats
Once we got our numbers we stocked up on food and drink with the excellent goodie bag on offer before exiting the tent to do a win-and-spin lucky draw. Ahead of his 991st marathon, Julian was hoping that a hip replacement was one of the prizes but won a R50 gift voucher instead. I won some chocolate chip cookies (which I successfully hid from my daughters*).
* In case anyone was wondering, I hid them in my stomach.
The race accommodation was at the Elangeni Resort, just behind the Spanish themed Malaga Hotel, which also serves as the half marathon start. A large proportion of the organising team from the Nedbank Mpumalanga Running Club were also staying there and the coals were looking good just as we arrived. The main behind the tongs was Mark Greeff, whom I had written about in the build up to Comrades 2024 but had never met in person. Most of the crew initially seemed quite flustered and harassed with the pressure of the race but they were notably more relaxed after a steady intake of medicinal compound (with barley and hops being the main ingredient).
READ MORE: Giving Comrades plenty of Greeff
However, it was an early start (even with a bus pickup from our doorstop) and Julian is old and I was nervous so we retired early, setting the alarms for just after 3am. I was cautious enough to only have two beers which is the least amount of carbo loading I think I’ve ever done before a marathon.
The bus trip to the start in Waterval Boven was efficient as were the facilities with plenty of toilets as well as coffee and bananas on offer. A power cut caused a minor delay before we got going shortly after 5:30am. I passed the time with some pleasant conversation with other runners whilst I ate my peanut butter sandwich and lathered up with suncream before doing the bag drop off.
The race provides mat to mat timing for prospective qualifiers. I was not in need of a qualifier but did self-seed right at the back of the field where everything was relaxed, including the flaccid banner drooping over the start which looked like it needed a shot of Viagra.
Another person who took a relaxed start was Tebogo Pulusa from Dwarsriver Mine AC who started 6 minutes late due to some travel issues. Whilst qualifier timing is mat to mat, standard competition rules for prize money are gun to mat, and this applied. However, this presented the very unusual situation where two time Comrades winner, Tete Dijana’s, winning gun time of 2:18:18 was 3 minutes slower than Pulusa’s mat time of 2:15:16 (his gun time was 2:21:42 which was good enough for fourth place).
The race starts with a gentle 1.5km downhill followed by 1.5km of uphill to the highest point on the route at 1464m. At this point the race spits you out onto the N4 and from there it’s ‘all downhill to the finish’.
The winding first 3km through the town produces a route map that looks like a fishhook – which is appropriate since you are reeled in to the finish a full 536m below the highest point.
The Nedbank Mpumalanga Running Club had hosted several races in Mpumalanga but had never organised a marathon before they decided to resurrect the defunct Elands Marathon in 2022 after a 10-year absence. Trans African Concessions were keen to partner with the club to put on a premium event. Block told me, “They are the best sponsor for a road race as they have resources for the road maintenance which we use. They have 2 x 8 tonne trucks with drivers, they have teams for road care which we can use. The list just goes on and on.” It also makes it easy to secure a full road closure on the route, making running a pleasure.
I can confirm that TracN4 are wonderful sponsors of the Elands Marathon – so much so that I almost didn’t mind paying my toll fees on the way home. They also showed compassion and empathy for their runners with this warning sign after the 3km warm up, just before the long plummet down the Elands Valley.
The steepest drop (230m) occurs between kilometres 3 and 9 and this is where many people come unstuck by going out too hard and struggling over the second half of the course which flattens out. There are also two very small hills in the last 12km and the last kilometre is ever so slightly uphill. Those who did go out too hard swear that these hills are ‘vicious monsters’ (and it would be completely appropriate to accuse these runners of ‘making a mountain out of a molehill’).
The route is very scenic, especially the first half which is run to the backdrop of the Steenkampsberg (which is part of the greater Drakensberg Mountain Range) with its rugged cliffs, misty mountain tops and beautiful landscapes.
A combination of fatigue and the billowing smoke from the Ngodwana Power Plant and Sappi paper factory makes the second half a lot less visually appealing.
A particular highlight is heading through the Waterval Boven Tunnel which is preceded by some excellent support from the local villagers who were encouraging us by singing and dancing. The organisers are committed to upliftment in the area with their beneficiaries being the Ehublweni choir and dance group from Emgwenya and three primary schools located along the route. They all repay in kind with vociferous support during the race.
Another popular downhill marathon in Mpumalanga, Kaapsehoop, has had issues with their water supply during recent years. However, with an impressive scaling up of numbers by over 1,000 finishers a year for the last three years, the Nedbank LVCC Club provides a blueprint to other races for how to scale up your numbers and still provide a great running experience.
There was a steady supply of cold water and cooldrink at every support table – clearly all that planning around the braai the night before paid off! On top of this, the support table frequency goes from every 3km in the first half to every 2km over the much hotter second half.
As per the photos below, I was interested to see that Chuck Norris jokes still pack a punch (pun intended) in the Mpumalanga lowveld. I am also always impressed seeing marathoners on the road with ‘non-traditional running bodies’. Full credit to the Cheetahs AC runner on the right who could give Ox Nché a run for his money. Not sure of the salad-to-cake ratio of his diet but he finished just ahead of me safely under 5 hours.
On that note, weighing in at 900 kg and standing at 1.8 meters (6 feet) tall at the shoulder, the Eland is the world’s largest antelope. So perhaps the race should offer a special ‘Eland’ trophy for the largest runner to complete the marathon each year.
My only race day complaint was with the Uniwisp waterpoint for false advertising. The below sign definitely implied that there would be beer on offer but the table was dry when I got there. I did wonder whether the faster runners had drunk it all but my official beer spotter, Duncan Bousted from Sunninghill AC (who is an authentic beer shark that can smell and locate a single drop of beer within a 5 mile radius), confirmed after the race that there was never any beer at the Uniwisp table.
They say you should never try anything new on race day but the thirsty, bike-urious Elands Marathon runner might want to pop in and see what goes down at the Aloes Pub. The sign board on the right offers “2 x double brandy” for R75. I guess you’d call that double trouble which had me wondering whether anyone has ever run to the start of Elands for an out-and-back ultra?
Towards the end of a marathon, your mind can play tricks on you. This seemed to happen to a lot of runners who swore to me that they encountered some hectic uphills but here’s the photographic evidence that this is as tough as the hills get.
As we got close to the finish, it was great to see award winning bus driver, Shahieda Thungo, shepherding her passengers to a safe sub-5 hour finish. With this being the last qualifying weekend for Two Oceans – and Comrades having reverted to the 5h qualifier time – there were plenty of people who had travelled from afar to take advantage of Elands’ easy route in an attempt to secure their place in the starting blocks of the planet’s two biggest ultras.
An added bonus is that Elands offers mat to mat timing for qualification. I arrived at the finish on the Sappi fields with a gun time of 18 seconds over 5 hours but with a mat time of 4h55. After a two-month taper and not knowing how my body would hold out I was pretty happy just to get a finish. I certainly felt stronger than some of the runners hunting down their 5 hour threshold in the heat – as you can see from the photo below it looked like a battlefield just over the finish line.
With gentle downhills over much of the route, Elands is one of the easiest marathons in the country. Personally, I think the sea-level altitude, cooler weather and camber free roads at East London’s Tony Viljoen Masters Marathon narrowly edges Elands into second place on the ‘easiest’ marathon list.
READ MORE: Tony Viljoen Masters Marathon (Pure unadulterated running erotica)
On seeing me getting out of the car after the three-hour drive home, my wife burst into laughter at my awkward and ungainly gait and told me that I was “walking like a crab” (to which I replied “Well, that’s better than arriving home with crabs!”).
The first time I ran the Elands Marathon was in my second year of running in 2003. Back then, I took it as an easy training run and paced a friend to his first sub 3h30. I reflected back on my running log from over two decades ago and can confirm that I found written proof that Elands was indeed an easy marathon back then. However, now that I am in my late 40s there is definitely no such thing as an easy marathon.
I really enjoyed your Elands write up…as you say there is no such thing as an easy marathon…it was only the 2nd race in over 20 years I ended up in the medical tent battlefield….managed to get myself dehydrated as my taste buds rebelled against the taste of the water…
If you drive that route from the finish towards the start, you will see that there is a lot of climbing to be done after half way. This is a very deceptive route.