Tete Morena Dijana believes that he could have finished the Comrades Marathon in good time if he didn’t find the race too tough when he started earlier this morning.
Dijana confesses that the first 30 minutes of the race were hard.
“Honestly speaking, I didn’t start the race very well, and that is because I never had enough rest yesterday which drained the energy out of me,” said the 37-year-old runner from Mahikeng, North West.
Dijana was speaking after breasting the tape in 05: 25: 28 which saw him fail to break his own record of 05: 14: 19, which he set in 2023.
He beat this record after surpassing David Hatebe’s best time of 05: 18: 19 in 2019.
Flying past competition
He overtook Onalenna Khonkhobe who was in the lead for the better part. Khonkhobe suffered injuries, allowing Dijana to take the lead.
Last year’s winner Piet Wiersma gave a good account of himself.
It was however Dijana who took charge with 10km to go. He started to open a gap, completely breaking away from the Dutchman, who ultimately finished second.
The 89km down-run is demanding.
Wiersma won the up-run battle last year.
“I had stomach issues for the past three days which only became better this morning. But nevertheless, I congratulate Dijana because he has proved that he is the king of the down-run in this competition,” said Wiersma.
The top 10 winners
1.Tete Dijana
2.Piet Wiersma
3. Nikolai Volkov
4. Edward Mothibi
5. Joseph Monyadi
6. Alex Milne
7. David Gatebe
8. Bong’musa Mthembu
9. Gordon Lesetedi
10. Vasilii Koryykin
Steyn remains the queen
Gerda Steyn won the women’s section of the race.
She finished in 05: 51: 19 seconds.
This was her third consecutive title.
Winners received R875 000 with runners-up taking home R438 000.
