Pacing can make or break your Comrades Marathon. Go out too fast on Sunday and you are in for a long day. Go out too slow and you will be chasing the clock all day. But how do you get your pacing strategy spot on?
You are going to lose some time at the start. Everyone does. It is normal. Don’t try and make that time up in the first five to ten kilometres of the race. The Comrades Marathon is called that because it is a marathon. It is not called the Comrades Sprint. Running too fast too early can be extremely costly. If you find yourself running faster than you should running on race day, back off and slow down. In the words of Comrades Coach Lindsey Parry, “If you don’t slow down now, Comrades will slow you down later”.
Lindsey gives some more great advice on this episode of the Ask Coach Parry podcast about how to run the perfectly paced Comrades Marathon.