The Nurgalieva twins, Olesya and Elena, do not decide beforehand which of them will cross the line ahead of the other when they compete together. For this reason, Olesya, who won the 2007 Comrades Marathon down run from Pietermaritzburg to Durban, was champion on merit.
The overall winner was Harmony Gold team runner Leonid Shvetsov of Russia, who set a new mark of five hours, 20 minutes and 49 seconds in winning the down run. He bettered the 21-year-old record of the great Bruce Fordyce, who set a mark of 5:24:07 set in 1986.
The Russian twins, who have dominated the Comrades in recent years, confirmed that before the race they discussed team strategies but that there was no collusion on who would win on any given day.
They did say that they love running together, and this is what happened Sunday when they found themselves clear of the field by about 10 minutes or more heading towards the finish line at the Sahara Stadium in Durban.
However, Elena said at a media briefing that she felt she was tiring over the last 9km or so, and that enabled sister Olesya to beat her to the line by a paltry 29 seconds in a winning time of six hours, 10 minutes and 10 seconds.
Both said that they had feared the challenge of third-placed Madina Biktigirova, also of Russia, who at one stage was in the lead.
But once Biktigirova dropped back — the race distance, she confirmed, was far too long for her as her previous longest run was 56km — they knew the race was theirs for the taking.
The twins also confirmed that, all being equal, they would be back for next year’s up run from Durban to Pietermaritzburg.
Biktigirova, who finished third, 11 minutes and 52 seconds behind winner Olesya, said: ”The Comrades is all about experience.” She added: ”I really did not think about it being so far at the start in Pietermaritzburg, but as the race progressed, I don’t think I have every experienced such pain. It really is very different.
”I always had the desire to be a winner here, but knee problems that hampered my training coming into the race certainly played a role in my not managing to stay in touch with the twins.”
Asked if she would return in 2008 for the up run from Durban, she said: ”That is something I will have to think about seriously. I do believe the race is too long for me. I am not really ready for this kind of contest. But that is a decision for next year.”
One of the features of the race was the fact that South Africa’s best-placed woman competitor, Farwa Mentoor, maintained her remarkable run of winning successive golds for the fifth time.
In finishing fourth, Mentoor broke a possible one-to-five Russian dominance of the 2007 Comrades. Yolande MacLean of South Africa was seventh, with Alinda Kruger ninth and the ever-popular Grace de Oliveira 10th.
Runner collapses
An unidentified runner collapsed on the finish line after being carried in by several fellow runners trying to get across the line before the 11-hour cut-off. A full range of medical staff performed CPR at the finish line on the runner for at least 20 minutes before he was moved.
The Comrades Marathon Association confirmed the runner that collapsed was a 33-year-old male, who later died.
Fellow runner Carsten Frischmuth, from RAC and running in his second race, was one of the runners who helped carry the man across the line. He said he couldn’t believe how quickly his condition had worsened.
”He ran past us with 2km to go, encouraging all of us to come along. When we got to 1km to go he started wandering all over the road and then collapsed inside the stadium. We had to make a call on whether we should leave him and call the medics or go on. We decided to help carry him through and make the 11-hour cut-off,” he said.
Another male runner had also collapsed and was said to be in a critical condition in hospital. — Sapa