by Stephen Granger
Stephen Lesego Mokoka returns to his happy hunting ground near the southern tip of the continent this week to return to race the Sanlam Cape Town Marathon on Sunday (October 16).
Mokoka makes no secret of the fact that Cape Town is one of his favourite racing destinations and has been associated with many of his track and road titles and records during the past decade, over distances ranging from 5000m to the marathon.
One of the most experienced distance athletes on the continent, Mokoka won twelve national track titles between 2008 and 2018 in distances between 1500m and 10 000m and was nigh unbeatable at the national 10k and half marathon championships.
Top performances in Cape Town include Mokoka’s win against Kenya’s best, in the Cape Town OneRun 12km in 2015 and his win in the 2018 Cape Town Marathon, where Mokoka outran a powerful field to clinch victory in a race record time of 2 hrs 08 min 31 sec, confirming his ability to manage the ‘business end’ of the race.
Mokoka will be looking to retain his 100% record at Cape Town Marathon on Sunday, although he does not list victory as one of his two primary goals for the race.
“Following the Olympic Marathon, my first goal is simply to finish the marathon,” said Mokoka. “Then my second is to run a fast time – Cape Town always offers that opportunity, if the weather conditions are good. I think for me it is important to consolidate and rebuild following the Olympics, where things did not go as planned.”
Mokoka ran with the race leaders in Sapporo, Japan, for almost three-quarters of the race in search of a place on the podium and an Olympic medal. Not afraid to mix it with the likes of Eliud Kipchoge, Mokoka took the race lead at halfway but experienced a relatively sudden onset of a brain-body dysfunction which ended his race in the second half.
“Before that I had really enjoyed every moment of the race,” Mokoka admitted. “But then my body simply was not responding to what I wanted it to do. It was not reacting in the way I had hoped for at that stage of the race and (I) felt I was unable to continue.”
The fact that Mokoka only ran three-quarters of the Olympic Marathon could count in his favour on Sunday, with his body reserves unlikely to have been depleted to the same extent. And Mokoka is confident he has recovered fully from the race.
“My training has been going well – everything seems good and on track,” Mokoka reflected. “I did my last long run of 30km in Bloemfontein this last weekend and I was happy with the way it went. Of course, one never knows in the marathon – there are so many factors to consider.”
Mokoka may be reluctant to predict a win there is no denying his desire to run a fast time.
“I see there will be no pacers this year, so it will be more like a championship race. Generally, pacers help with running fast times as they force us to run at greater effort. But if other elites can take on the pace at times, we can still set a good pace ourselves and qualify for next year’s World Championships (2 hrs 11 min 30 sec).”
Mokoka is positive about the advantages of running an elite race in his home country. “If I was racing in Asia or Europe, by this time I would be worrying about travel documentation, flights, time difference and many other things. It’s the week of the race, and I’m still relaxing at home with my family and only travelling down on Thursday.
“It will also be great to have a full field of runners back again – that helps a lot with having home support. When I hear other runners or spectators shouting my name, I feel supported and that lifts my running. We have not had mass fields for a long time and it makes me excited to be racing again as part of a mass marathon.”
His family and friends won’t travel with Mokoka to Cape Town, but his wife Zinhle in Johannesburg and family at 600 Village, Mafikeng, where he was born, will again be glued to the television in the hopes that their favourite will again return with the Cape Town Marathon title and a ticket to next year’s World Championships.
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