No earth-shattering finishes

The Sole Destroyer Half-Marathon on Sunday may well have attracted a fair-sized field, but the men’s results were a tad disappointing.

Going back to the origins of the race, the first winner was Makaya Masumpa, still running today as a 52-year-old master, and he recorded a time of 70:15. The second runner recorded 70:21 and the third 70:30.

In recent years the race has been won by Real Gijima, Luthando Hejana who, in 2015, ran a still respectable 73:51 for the tough route. He won it easily. In 2016 he was pushed to a faster 72:31 by Nedbank’s Nkosinathi Nzingo.

On Sunday he cantered in for a 74:16.

Malixole Kaledeni of Old Selbornians was second. Kalideni, who was third in 2015, improved on that 80:04 by a staggering 5:24.

The next three men were all in the veteran category, while inaugural winner Masumpa finished seventh 25 years later.

Third place fell to Born 2 Run’s Vusumzi Zondo, who raced to capture the King of The Mountain award and then hung in to finish in 78:58.

Jessica Pollock of the University of Cape Town sped to an impressive win in the women’s race, given that she was on the podium on Friday afternoon at the SA Universities Cross-Country Championships over 10km.

Pollock won in a good 87:42, which compares favourably with Diane Sandford’s inaugural win in 91:45 and Border’s fastest female runner, Hanlie Botha’s 88:27 in 2015.

Andrea Ranger, a previous winner of the race, bounced back strongly after her Master’s Marathon disappointment. The tough Easy Equities Born 2 Run team member finished second in 93:35, while Ingrid Webber of Oxford Striders was third in 99:22.

The top veterans in both men’s and women’s races finished in fourth place when Mndeni Zulu of Oxford Striders clocked an 80:00 and Born 2 Run’s Karen Davis ran 1:42:11.