Hamlett looking to add to his galaxy of Comrades champions

JOHN HAMLETT ‘s passion for the Comrades Marathon is contagious. Spend time in the former South Africa Defence Colonel’s presence and you suddenly find yourself wanting to lace-up for the grueling race between the KwaZulu/Natal cities of Durban and Pietermaritzburg.

A renowned champion-producer who has run the race himself, he specializes in training athletes just to tackle The Ultimate Human Race. It’s been a while since he had a runner be the first to breast the finish line tape, but that has not dissuaded him from pushing on – Hamlett yet again taking a sizeable group of runners to the race taking place this weekend.

“We’ve got a good group Mats, and they are all ready to challenge for honours,” he says of the Pan African Resources Club (PAR) athletes who will line up among the elites at the start of the 98th running of this world famous ultra in front of the Pietermaritzburg City Hall early on Sunday.

Leading the charge for glory will no doubt be the highly experienced Gordon Lesetedi, the three-time gold medalist who will be lining up for his 10th race.

Out in the high-altitude, quaint small tourist town of Dullstroom which has served as Hamlett’s base for cooking up Comrades Marathon champions – Lesetedi is the senior citizen following the retirement of 2015 king Gift Kelehe. And he always leads by example during the long and hard training runs Hamlett gets the athletes doing so they are ready on race day.

I visited them a fortnight ago and they all looked lean and ready to hand Hamlett his fifth champion – eager to follow in the footsteps of Kelehe, his older brother Andrew as well as 2016 Down Run winner with a record David Gatebe plus Ann Ashworth.

Lesetedi was in particularly high spirits, confident that he would eventually get that podium finish (top three) he has been chasing for years.

“Ke nako,” he tells me as we settle out in the suny backyard of the cozy little house they’ve called home for six weeks then. “It might be the 10th race and I know that for a lot of runners the Green Number (given after you’ve completed the race 10 times) is special. But for me it is just like any other ace and I am going to give it my best. I’ve generally done well in the Down Run (From Maritzburg to Durban) and I believe I usually get it right.”

His dream of the top three is yet to happen because he believes the Comrades Marathon is always dependent on what happens on race day.

“It is a very long race and you can say before the race that you are ready to win or to do well, but then things might go wrong on the day. I am confident I can do well this year because I believe I can break the 5:20 that I ran in 2023 and of course if I get that time, then I will definitely be in the top three. I think a 5:17 will be good enough to put you up there.”

Lesetedi is experienced enough to know that the race only begins after the 60km mark and he figured that it is different from the past and unlike then, it is hard to break from the leading bunch early on in the race.

Though yet to podium, the man from Sekhing in the North West – the home of the Kelehe brothers who are his role models and inspiration - looks back at his Comrades career with delight because ‘my times are always improving with every race’.

“And for now, it is no longer just about the gold, we are going for the podium and the win. I’ve got the experience and I am coached by a man who knows how to win this thing.”

Alongside Lesetedi in the black, gold and white colours of PAR will be a handful of young men with a bright future in ultra-running who have got Hamlett excited that he could produce a champion yet again – if not this year in the near future..

Gift Mokoena has been with Hamlett since after the Covid pandemic and has been gradually improving, so much so that he narrowly missed out on gold last year.

“I was in the top 10 when we got to Polly Shortts but I cramped a little and that’s when I lost out on gold,” said the man from Bethlehem of his 13th place finish and he is confident he will do better this time around.

He was particularly disappointed at missing out on a target he’d set himself when he got into ultra running: “My goal was to get my first gold last year for it to coincide with my 40th birthday. But I missed out on that and it was very disappointing. But I am this guy who learns from my mistakes everytime and I now know exactly what to do to get that gold.”

Inspired by Andrew Kelehe and 2003 champions Fusi Nhlapo – who was trained by Hamlett until shortly before the race – Mokoena says he has done everything right and is looking forward to making his coach, himself and family proud.

Proud Chauke is a confident 31-year-old from Malamulele who wears his heart on his sleeve: “I always run a race to win, all races. My mentality is always to win the race.

According to the races I ran this year and what the coach has been telling me, I am confident that I will do very well this time. The coach has been telling me that I can win Comrades and I believe I can do it. I am going there to compete for a win.”

Chauke also derives his confidence from his victory at the Border to Border ultra (between Mozambique and Swaziland) in a good time of 3:54 and even went on to finish second in the Balwin Marthon in Durban.

With three Comrades Marathons to his name, Chauke says he owes himself a good race given that the previous ones were ran on injuries and that he also made some rookie mistakes in some of them – once pulling out of the lead bunch thinking they were going too fast and that he would catch them one by one.

“I was not aware that there were no longer hills after that and they left me and I just could not catch them. That was a painful lesson because if I had stuck with them I could have done very well. But I am experienced now and coach has taught me all the tricks and I am ready to run a PB. I have a 5:41 but this time I want a 5:20. It’s a time that we believe can give me a podium finish if not a win.”

Chauke wants to see the Comrades title going back to Limpopo to end the long drought given that the last time a runner from that province won was back in 2012 when Ludwick Mamabolo reigned supreme.

The other athletes in Hamlett’s group are Musa Zweni, Vuyo Hagiole as well as the roses among the thorns in Kelebogile Motshabi and Wanda Britz.

Will any of them give Hamlett yet a nother win to cement his legacy as a Comrades Champion Coach?