Make sure you stay with the bus for big challenge

WHEN a pace setter of a group he was running with became sick during the Comrades Marathon in 2011, Derrick Rondganger was asked to take the driver’s seat and lead the group home.

He had paced local races in the Western Cape on several occasions before, but not the Big C.

Surrounded by team members from Telkom Athletic Club, his wife Pearl and other Comrades hopefuls, Rondganger took over the reins.

Before then, he had never thought of pacing the Comrades, known as the Ultimate Human Race.

Rondganger, 60, has been running for more than 30 years, 10 of which were spent setting the pace for other runners.

This is a voluntary role he chose out of his love for running.

He is a familiar face at races across the province and has a following of people who not only rely on his skill and patience to take them to the finish, but also use his bus to time themselves. Rondganger is a bus driver. This is a term used in running to refer to a pace setter during a race. An official pace setter carries a flag with their name and their anticipated finishing time.

They lead the pack and dir- their own.

“It’s important to check that all the passengers are doing okay and are comfortable. My wife sometimes tells me when someone is struggling at the back,” he says.

“I always advise people who want to run with me to start the race with me. That helps to run at a steady pace at the start, reserving energy that will be required for the second half of the race,” he says.

Sometimes runners feel energetic at the start and push at a high pace and when they run out of energy, hope to be picked up by the bus to the finish.

“I cannot pick you up later in the race because you are out of energy and you may not be able to keep up with the pace of the bus.”

Rondganger says that in ultra marathons, it is best to start slowly and go faster as the race continues.

There will be 19 bus drivers at the Comrades this year, six of whom will be pacing the sub-12-hour buses.

This is the last group of runners who cross the finish line just before the 12-hour cutoff.

Asked about his strategy for the Comrades up run next Sunday, Rondganger said: “If you stick with me, I will take you on a comfortable journey.”

Derrick Rondganger, the only official Comrades pace setter from the Western Cape