There seems to be no stopping Stephan Mokoka (Boxer) in local races at the moment.
On Saturday he won the inaugural Bestmed Tuks Marathon (2:32:02). The previous weekend he won the Bronkhorstspruit 32km.
The scary thing is that Mokoka claims that he was not racing to win. He considers his performances as just proper hard training runs in the build-up to the IAAF Half-marathon Championships in Valencia (24 March).
“The goal I set myself at the World Championships is to improve on my best time of 1:04:40.”
Mokoka’s ultimate goal is to be able to run a 2:05:00 marathon at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. His current best time is 2:07:40. He is confident about improving his time by more than two minutes over the next three years.
Sikhumbuzo Seme (KPMG) finished second in the Bestmed Tuks Marathon running 2:33:47 with the evergreen veteran, Shadrock Hoff (Maxed Elite) third in 2:38:08.
Charné Bosman (Nedbank RC) was true to her word. She won the women’s marathon in 2:50:57. Her time was two minutes faster than she predicted she would run.
The former Comrades champion who is being assisted by the HPC ascribes her performance to be able to stick to her game plan.
“I purposely started off slightly conservative as I wanted to be able to accelerate towards the end of the race. It worked. Over the first few kilometres, my race pace was about 4 minute and 8 seconds per kilometre, and I ended up running at 3 minutes 50 seconds pace over the last kilometres. To be able to do so proves that the training I am doing is starting to pay dividends especially considering that the Bestmed Tuks Marathon is not an easy run.”
Bosman praised the organisers of the Bestmed Tuks-events saying it was well organised.
Ann Ashworth (Massmart) was the second athlete to finish running 3:09:48. Salome Cooper (Born2Run) was third in 3:11:09.
The men’s half-marathon was won by Benedict Moeng (KPMG) in a time of 1:10:08 while Vuyokazi Gabe (CSIR) was victorious in the women’s race. Her winning time was 1:24:17.
Milton Kekana (TUT) running 30:48 and Glenrose Xaba (Boxer) running 34:56 were the respective men’s and women’s winners in the 10km race.
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