Ryan Sandes, who has stood on more of world’s trail podiums than most over the past two decades, is the architect of tomorrow’s (Saturday 23 May) Cape Town Trail Marathon, presented by the Sanlam Cape Town Marathon.
The creator of the world-renown ’13 Peaks Challenge’ has brought his knowledge of Table Mountain’s finest trails to this unique event, which will see some of the continent’s leading exponents of the sport doing battle for prestige and prizes over 11km, 22km and 43km.
Sandes’ partnership with the Sanlam Cape Town Marathon is a powerful one, linking the continent’s top road marathon with a sparkling trail race which will likely attract some of the world’s best in years to come. And it is the only World Marathon Major – current or in the making – to do so.
“Runners will traverse from the stadium to above the city to experience the flora and fauna and sweeping vistas of the Atlantic,” Sandes explained. “The trail weaves through one of the world’s most diverse and rare floral kingdoms, the Cape Floristic Region. Many species on this trail are not found anywhere else on Earth.”
Adding to the excitement this year is a partnership with one of the world’s most competitive trail races, Sierra Zinal, run in the Valais Alps in Switzerland in early August, whereby the male and female winners of the 2026 43km Cape Town Trail Marathon will win a fully paid trip to compete in the great Swiss race.
“This will be a fantastic prize for this year’s winners,” Sandes remarked. “We would also love it if the winners of Sierra Zinal might come and race in Cape Town next year, but that would likely depend on the schedules of their winners.”
The Sierra Zinal records are held by two legends of the sport – Spanish super-star, Kilian Jornet, and Swiss athlete Maude Mathys, but Kenyan athletes have excelled at the top Swiss race in recent years, sweeping the men’s podium last year and with Philemon Kiriago and Caroline Kimutai taking individual honours.
And while several Kenyan global superstars will take centre stage in Sunday’s road marathon, three athletes from that nation’s hotbed of distance running are favoured for podium positions in tomorrow’s ‘King Protea’ 43km marathon..
Kiriago’s younger brother, Isaya, is clearly blessed with a generous share of the gene-pool which has taken Philemon to trail glory around the planet and could prove tough to beat on Cape Town’s trails tomorrow.
No stranger to those trails, he destroyed the field in last year’s Ultra-trail Cape Town 23km race, finishing almost eleven minutes clear of Zimbabwe-born Collin Kanyimo, who won the 2024 Cape Town Trail Marathon and who will be looking to regain his title tomorrow.
Kiriago was the joint winner with Simon Ngumbau at the Kereita Forest Trail Race over 32km in Kenya in December and took line honours at a 35km race in Kenya in January this year. Ngumbau, will also compete tomorrow together with the third Kenyan, Dennis Bosire.
Bosire raced successfully in the Italian Alps five years back and placed second in the Hilly Resolutions Race in January.
Leading South African trail athlete, Robbie Rorich, proved the catalyst for the Kenyan participation, although will not be racing tomorrow. “Simon and I met on start line of last year’s UTCT 35km in November (the race was halted after an hour due to high winds),” explained Rorich. “He saw the Kenyan Flag in my bracelet, and we became friends there and then!
“I had already planned to be in Kenya for a six-week training block this year and it was great to meet up with Simon and his friends for some training sessions. The organisers of the Cape Town Trail Marathon have assisted their to travel to Cape Town to race this year.”
Stellenbosch athlete, ‘PK’ Sengce, ran the race of his life to hold off a fast-finishing Rorich to take last year’s Cape Town Trail Marathon title with German trail athlete, Marcel Hoeche, who led for most of the race, finishing third. Kanyimo trailed in fifth.
Rorich and Hoeche will not race tomorrow, but Sengce and Kanyimo will both be aiming to finish in the prize money, which this year stretches to the top five.
Top ten positions will be hard fought in a high-quality field. Athletes of the calibre of Cape Town’s Siviwe Nkombi and Iain Peterkin, who placed second and third respectively at the Two Oceans Trail Race last month, former Eastern Cape athlete, Mvuyisi Gcobo, who enjoyed a strong fourth place in last month’s Ultra-trail Drakensberg 62km, Kyle Bucklow, Christiaan van den Heever and Zimbabwean Charles Souza will all likely be in the mix.
The women’s field is less competitive, with several leading athletes opting to race the UTMB MUT in George next week. Maryke van Zyl (third in the UTD 33km), Simone Malan and Nadia Booyens (second in the UTD 62km ) likely to battle it out for the trip to Sierra Zinal.
Van Zyl is coached by multiple trail title winner, Landie Greyling, who won a close contest over Van Zyl and Booyens in last year’s Cape Town Trail Marathon in October – her final race before retirement. This year Greyling will likely be supporting her charge from the sidelines.
Free State athlete, Malan, won a close race over leading athletes Emily Djock, Kerry-Anne Marshall and Van Zyl in the Whale of Trail last year will be looking for another Cape triumph tomorrow.
The ‘Stately Protea’ Cape Town Trail 22km is always hard-fought. This year it offers up two mouth-watering contests which have the potential to steal the show from its higher-profile ‘King Protea’ cousin.
Siboniso Soldaka has been unbeaten in the race since losing to Teboho Noosi in 2019, but the current national 3000m steeplechase champion is away racing track in Europe.
Last year’s race was fiercely contested with Soldaka holding off Limpopo athlete Remaketse Lekaka by a whisker. Lekaka, who placed a strong third behind American Cody Lind and Robbie Rorich at last month’s UTD 62km, will be looking to climb to the top of the podium tomorrow.
The Limpopo athlete will have to overcome the challenge of one of South Africa’s most consistent trail athletes of the last decade, Kane Reilly, who often hits top form on local trails, which he knows intimately.
Reilly had been slated to race his debut road marathon on Sunday, but a ‘longstanding niggle’ sees him move to the trail half marathon where he could prove tough to beat.
Other athletes challenging for podium positions in a high-quality field include Mxolisi Nlovu (third in the 2024 race), Wano Katjiri, Nkululeko Khumala and Luwellyn du Toit.
Part of the global adidas TERREX team, Bianca Tarboton last raced in South Africa in October when she smashed the Otter TERREX Trail record by a sizeable margin.
Fresh from the adidas Innsbruck Alpine Trail Festival in Austria, where she placed 4th in s competitive 24km race three weeks ago, Tarboton takes on defending champion Ebeth Marais, who remains unbeaten since her return to competitive athletics just over a year ago and whose wins include Old Fisherman’s Trail, Pass to Pass 25km and the Two Oceans 24km races.
No stranger to the Cape Town Trail 22km, Tarboton, who won the event in 2018 and 2019 with her 1:45:30 time in the latter year unsurpassed, will be hard to beat.
Five races that form part of a festival weekend of running at the Sanlam Cape Town Marathon get underway tomorrow from the race village at the DHL Stadium Precinct.
The 43km Trail Marathon starts first at 6:30am, followed by the 22km Trail Run at 7:15am and the 11km Trail Run at 8:10am.
While the trail runners head up on to the slopes of Table Mountain and its neighbouring peaks, the road athletes will line up for the 10km Peace Run, starting at 7:30am, with the elite women heading off first, followed by the elite men at 7:37am and the rest of the field from 7:42am. The 5km Peace Run will start at 10am.
