For Comrades Tragics

This page hopefully is a quick reference to available information about the Comrades Marathon.

The official webpage can be found by clicking here.

Some 'Older Comrades Video's" can be found by clicking here.

Below are the headings under what I am trying to cover on this page.

This is a difficult question. For those who have never been to Comrades, the answer won't make sense, and for those who have been, they can't quite put it into words. The 'Comrades Experience", is more of a 'feeling' than a sentence.

The following promotional video, may help to explain:

So this is not a just a race over 89km, with a few 'crazy runners', this is a race which for 84 years has challenged a nation, and since the early 1990's, when South Africa rejoined the international community, it has become a race which is challenging the world.

Are you up to the challenge?

For one day every year, South Africa Stops and watch's the Comrades drama unfold on SABC, and now via the internet, people worldwide share in this drama.

Here is one look at the "Down Route", as broadcast on SABC TV:

In 2009, the SABC prepared and telecast the following animation of the course, as part of their live telecast:

There is a 'Chat Room' within the Comrades webpage, but if you prefer Facebook, the Comrades Marathon Facebook Group can be found by clicking here.

Bruce Fordyce is a 9 times winner of the Comrades Marathon, and his 'Facebook Fan Page', can be found by clicking here.

So if you are a Facebook member, why not join these groups?

'Coolrunning Australia', also has their own 'Comrades Threads' and the 2009 thread can be found by clicking here, and the 2010 thread can be found by clicking here

Disclosure: On 'Coolrunning Australia', my tag is 'Digger'(obviously).

Within this portal, I am also working on the following pages(But when you get to these pages, they my have limited data(maybe none) in the short term until I get time to source the content):

Short clips of the SABC 2009 TV coverage of canbe found by clicking here.

Some runners have documented their Comrades experiences and they canbe found by clicking here

During the SABC 2009 telecast, they had short clips of historical Comrades Footage, and some of it canbe found by clicking here

My 2009 Comrades trip videos can be found by clicking here

If you know of any other web sources, please let me know so I can add them to the list.

The CMA, since 2005 has been rolling out a programme of appointing Ambassadors in various regions of the world, with the ultimate aim of having an Ambassador in every country. This programme is on going, and at the moment they have the following representatives in the following country's:

Mark Bloomfield:USA

Marie Barreau:France

Nato Amaral:Brazil

Sandy Kondo:Japan

Sandy Stevens:United Kingdom

Bruce Hargreaves:Australia

The Ambassadors are there to help and encourage runners from their country to make the trip to South Africa, and they do this on a voluntary basis, and therefore they are true 'Comrade Tragics'.

If you country does not have an Ambassador, then please consult with the Ambassador closest to where you live.

If you have run a Comrades, and think you have what it takes to be an Ambassador, and your country is not represented or if you know of a fellow Comrades runner from your country who would be suitable, then please do not hesitate to forward the relevant details to Thami at the CMA for consideration.

The CMA has also empower each Ambassador to appoint 'Comrade Consuls', in States/Provinces/City's with in there region, to help spread the word about Comrades. These Consuls will be given Brochures, car stickers etc to distribute at runs and similar functions in their area's.

At the moment, only the USA has Consuls, and they are:

Mike Pastore:Greenville, South Carolina

Heather Tarr:Denver, Colorado

Rick Ganzi:Holland, Michigan

John Aerni:St Loius, Missouri

Jim Pugh:Boston, Massachusetts

Phillip Hesser:Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania