Tete Dijana and Gerda Steyn were crowned king and queen of the Comrades Marathon when they won their respective divisions in the iconic annual race from Pietermaritzburg to Durban.
Dijana was winning his third Comrades, doing so in 5hr 24min 27sec, while Steyn was earning a fourth win in the race, clocking 5:51:19.
Dijana out-duelled defending champion Piet Wiersma, to add to the titles he won in 2022 and 2023. Wiersma crossed the line (5:25:33) less than 10 seconds behind Dijana. Nikolai Volkov was third in 5:29:42.
It came down to the final 8.5km of the down run, in which Dijana running at the front would outlast Wiersma.
“I was so excited. Very, very excited and also emotional because I remember what happened last year… I was in the best shape, but the devil came, so I was happy that at least the devil didn’t attack me this year,” Dijana said.
“I’ve been getting pressure from social media saying, ‘don’t let it go again’, they used the word again. So I had to fix everything.”
On the women’s front, Steyn said: “I set out at not too blistering a pace, a little bit more of a conservative approach. I really wanted to run the race correctly. It worked out well. It got comfortable for most of the way.
“There was a little bit of a moment where I realised that Alexandra (Morozova) was closing the gap on me quite significantly in the really last stages of the race, which really made me stay on my toes and make sure that I am 100% focused and getting the most out of myself.”
