The qualifying season moves to the North West Province on February 16 when a host of Comrades and Two Oceans hopefuls look to the Aurum Klerksdorp Marathon to provide an opportunity to secure their all-important seeding times for South Africa’s two biggest events.
The Aurum Klerksdorp Marathon starts and finishes at Wesvalia High School and provides runners with 10km, 21.1km and 42.2km options, but it is the marathon distance that will attract the most interest.
With the Comrades and Two Oceans qualifying deadlines on May 4 and March 9 respectively, those runners who have not already completed their seeding and qualification requirements need to structure their training programmes around a 42,2km or longer even  so as to finalise their participation in one or both of South Africa’s premier road running events.
Klerksdorp offers runners the chance to run a two-lap 42,2km event with relatively little elevation change, creating an opportunity to post quick times which in turn will lead to a better seeding for Comrades and Two Oceans.
In 2019 Jeffrey Moabankwe emerged as a comfortable winner of the standard marathon distance in a time of 2:24:40, with Gordon Lestedi and Thabiso Bontsi filling the lower two steps on the podium while Leilani Scheffer produced a quick time of 2:53:48 to claim the women’s title.
The half marathon 21,1km distance events saw Joel Mmone outsprint David Manja to win in a time of 1:07:33 while Rone Reyneke and Adele Broodryh were the top two female competitors.
The marathon and half-distance event start at 5.30am with the 10km runners setting off on their journey at 6.30am. The entry fee for the 42,2km is R160 and R120 for the half distance and R60 for the 10km. There is a R40 charge for temporary licence for unlicenced athletes. Online entries close on February 12, and on-day entries will be takes for a R40 surcharge.
Online entries and more information available at bit.ly/KlerkMara2020Enter
This event is timed by FinishTime.