Author: Modern Athlete

Few of us ever reach the age of 100. In fact, most folks can’t even imagine making it to 90, and if they do, the last thing on their minds would be exercise. The next time you feel old and ready to hang up your sweat towel, you may want to consider a 99-year-old Australian great-grandmother called Ruth Frith, the oldest competitor in the upcoming Sydney 2009 World Masters Games.

Ruth trains six times a week and believes that everybody has to try their best. To this golden girl, it’s not about winning events, but about being brave enough to enter and compete, no matter what your age. This is the inspirational story of a granny to whom age is just a number. Modern Athlete spoke to Ruth, hoping to learn some of her secrets to staying healthy and young at heart.

She was always on the sidelines of the athletics field, a proud mother watching and encouraging her daughter to compete. While watching, athletes she had known for many years would dump their sport bags at her side, and she would be the designated guard, keeping an eye on the bags while they competed. Until one day. Ruth, then 74, had had enough. “If they can do it, I can too,” she told herself. That was in 1983, the start of Ruth’s long and glorious athletics career. Today she is the holder of five world records in the women’s 95-99 age category, that is, in the discus throw (9.85m), hammer throw (11.37m), shot put (4.72m), weight throw (5.11m) and weight pentathlon (5 544 points).

This Brisbane great-grandmother, who will turn 100 on 23 August, represents the Gold Coast Masters Athletics Club in competitions all over Australia. She has become the first centenarian to sign up for the Sydney 2009 World Masters Games, the world’s largest multi-sport event. This event is open to sportspeople of all abilities and most ages; anyone can compete as long as they satisfy their sports’ minimum age, which ranges between 25 and 35. The Games, held between 10 and 18 October, will see 25 000 people from more than 100 countries compete in 28 sports at more than 70 venues throughout Sydney, including many Olympic sites.

Ruth, who has been competing in Masters Athletics for 25 years, says she couldn’t wait to sign up for the Games. Turning 100 soon is no big deal to this proud grandmother of six grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren and two great, great-grandchildren. “To me, birthdays are all the same. I have never looked at it thinking that I’m getting old. It’s just another year gone by.” She is certainly not like any centenarian we could have imagined. Her voice is clear and her sense of humour is as sharp as that of a 30-year-old. She enjoys telling how she was charmed by South Africa on her visits in 1992 and 1997, and how much she loves the country.

She has outlived her husband, Raymond, who made it to the ripe old age of 97. The couple lived in Sydney, but when Raymond passed away after kidney failure, Ruth moved to Brisbane to live with her daughter and coach, Helen Searle. Her mother’s love of sport must be genetic, because 68-year-old Helen is also a world record-breaking athlete. She competed at the 1960 Rome Olympics and in 1964 in Tokyo. She won a bronze medal in high jump at the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Cardiff and a silver in high jump and long jump at the same Games held in 1962 in Perth. Mom and daughter will both compete at the Sydney 2009 World Masters Games.

Ruth, an athletics official at the shot put and discus events from 1960 to 2001, says that everyone is born with a gift of some sort. Her father was a good runner and she believes his gift was passed on to her. As a 10-year-old girl, she ran everywhere. She has participated in some sort of exercise throughout her life. She wanted to be a doctor, but unfortunately mathematics at school wasn’t her strongest subject. She eventually worked in admin in a solicitor’s office until she got married.

“I don’t think I have secrets to staying young. I am just blessed with good health. I don’t believe in diets and all that nonsense, because if you exercise, you don’t need to diet. Surprisingly, I don’t eat vegetables and potatoes, but I do like fruit.” She says she has a sweet tooth, but gets tired of all the chocolates she receives. “People don’t know what to give a 99-year-old, so I always end up with chocolates. I got nine boxes of chocolates last Christmas. I didn’t know what to do with them. My favourite treat is sponge cake with plenty of cream.” She loves cooking and gardening, but finds it difficult because her eyes are degenerating, leaving her half blind. When she competes, it’s in a category for athletes who can see a metre away. This has not kept her from giving it her all. “You put up with what you have. I have lived 99 years with red hair and freckles, and if you can do that, you can live with anything.”

Ruth trains six times a week. On three of those days, she will train 90 minutes per day in shot put, hammer throw and the other events she competes in. On the other three days, she starts off her training by cycling on a stationary bike for ten minutes and then does light weights in her sunroom.

Ruth’s life motto is to stay true to herself. She believes if you can’t do that, you can’t be true to anybody else. She loves athletics and wherever she goes, she motivates people to go out there and try. “Just the other day, I said to a lot of elderly people that even if you have grey hair and creaky knees, it shouldn’t stop you from exercising. Nobody is expecting you to be an Olympian, just do your best. I know for certain even if you are beaten, the sun will rise the next day. There is no disgrace in being second.” Ruth competes in tracksuit pants or shorts and wears her club vest proudly. But there was a time when she didn’t like wearing shorts. “Women didn’t even wear slacks in those days and most officials were men, so to go out there in a pair of shorts was like not wearing clothes at all.”

“I love training. I have always said that the day I don’t want to train, will be the day I give it up. I will be lost without sport in my life. If it gets taken away from me, it will be like taking my life away.” She’s looking forward to the Games, especially her favourite event which is hammer throw. One thing is certain: Ruth Frith is guaranteed to break records. “Whatever I do at the age of 100 will be a record. My goal is just to go out there and do the best I can.”

Extra sources: www.2009worldmasters.com

Name any South African city, Pretoria, Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban, and many of us can claim to have finished numerous races there, received another medal and added the umpteenth t-shirt to our already overflowing collection. Been there done that, we sometimes boast. One thing not many of us can say is that we have run seven marathons on seven continents, experienced penguins sitting on our laps and allowed a big burly Russian to scrub our shoes on board a boat in the Antarctica. Modern Athlete spoke to Dimitri Kavallineas about his Seven Continents journey – and starting it all over again.

STARTING OUT
It started out with holidays in faraway places and ended in the southernmost part of the world. As a runner with ten Comrades and 12 Two Oceans Marathons under his belt, Dimitri and his long time buddy, Charles Stewart, are always looking for a race to run while on holiday. They happily refer to themselves as ‘running tourists’.

After finishing the Boston Marathon in North America, the Athens Classic Marathon in Europe and the Buenos Aires Marathon in South America, Dimitri, a self-confessed running addict, realised a marathon on each continent was within his reach, and that one day, he could belong to the elite Seven Continents Club. And so the pilgrimage started. Dimitri and Charles were off to Australia in 2006 to run the Sydney Marathon, followed by the Beijing International Marathon in Asia the following year. Six continents (including their African mother continent) had been conquered and they had just one left to complete the set.

MARATHON MEMORIES
Each marathon holds a special place in Dimitri and Charles’ hearts. It was the different stadiums and the historic routes that especially stood out. The Athens Classic Marathon finished in a stadium with marble seating, built in 1896 for the first Modern Olympics, while the Beijing Marathon finished in the same stadium where the Olympic Games were held last year. As two seasoned Comrades runners, they sometimes got less than what they bargained for, but sometimes they got a whole lot more.

Dimitri was especially surprised when he ran up the so-called ‘Heartbreak Hill’ in the Boston Marathon, without even realising it. When he saw his supporters next to the road, they immediately asked how he felt going up the much talked about hill. “What hill?” Dimitri asked. “We are so used to hills coming from Pretoria, that this route was as flat as a pancake. It was a great marathon, but there were too many people (about 35 000). It took us nearly 13 minutes to cross the start,” Dimitri says.

It was a whole different story at the Athens Classic Marathon, much to Dimitri’s dismay. He looked at the profile of the race on the internet and interpreted it wrongly, expecting a few hills in the first 10km, followed by a flattish latter part of the race. “We started running and we just kept on climbing. The downhills never came. I had to wait for 32km before seeing a downhill!” Their marathon journey took them to some famous landmarks. They ran over the Sydney Harbour Bridge and finished at the Sydney Opera House. In Beijing, the two comrades ran the same route as the Olympic Marathon last year. But it was the big mama of marathons that still lay ahead; the Antarctica Marathon, often referred to as the Last Marathon, because it is the last place on Earth one would think to hold a long distance race.

THE END OF THE EARTH
Antarctica is bigger than Europe and twelve times as big as South Africa. It’s colder than anywhere else on Earth. It is no wonder that the Antarctica Marathon is seen as one of the most extreme marathons in the world. This was a challenge Dimitri and Charles were fired up to take on. The waiting list for entries is about two years. Dimitri and a group of friends, including Tom Cottrell, author and publisher, had to plan things meticulously. They flew to Buenos Aires and took a flight to Ushuaia in the south of Argentina. From Ushuaia – 3 900km from the South Pole – they took a boat to Antarctica, a trip that took about six days. “There were two boats filled with runners and their companions. The organisers decided to split the group of South Africans, because the year before, the South Africans apparently drank the bar dry before they got to the Antarctica,” says Dimitri.

The Last Marathon is certainly no ordinary marathon and you won’t find big numbers on this desolate piece of land. Competitors in the half marathon and female competitors started a few minutes earlier than the men. This was done to minimise the race’s ecological impact on the pristine conditions in this remote part of the world.

The race, with a combined field of no more than about 200 runners, started at the Bellingshausen Station, a Russian scientific research station on King George Island, which is part of the South Shetland Island group. Dimitri and Charles, as always, started together. Though they were kitted out in hi-tech thermal running gear, there was clearly a difference between the South Africans and other international runners, Dimitri says. “We pitched up with our normal running shoes while the North Americans pulled out their yak tracks – a harness with little spikes you pull over your running shoes to stop you from slipping on ice and snow. They were clearly better prepared than us.”

Surprisingly, it wasn’t as cold at the start as they expected. At 9am it was just below zero degrees, feeling like a very cold Johannesburg morning. The route was marked out in a figure of eight, over an unforgiving terrain of glaciers and muddy snowy hills. Runners had to follow flags along the way and carry their own hydration packs as there were no manned water tables. Unlike South African road races, in which you see runners pulling in behind bushes for a much needed stop, competitors weren’t allowed to stop anywhere for a loo break. They had to go into one of the stations to use the toilet.

DETERMINATION
Charles, who has run nine Comrades, slipped about 6km into the race and hit his head. A doctor on the route had a look at him and diagnosed him with a concussion. He was a bit confused, but he would be fine. “The waiting list for this race is two years. It’s not like normal races where you can go back the next weekend and do another one. We decided to push through,” says Dimitri, but both men knew a battle lay ahead. It was already hard enough dealing with the terrain. Dimitri compares running on that terrain to running on an ice cube. Not an easy thing to expect from anyone, let alone a man with a concussion. Dimitri kept on asking his Phobians-running mate if he was okay, refusing to leave him behind. The course was marked out in miles and Charles, totally dazed, kept asking Dimitri where they were. “He couldn’t remember a single thing and I had to repeat everything. I must admit, it took my mind off things.”
 
As the day progressed, an icy wind and sleet set in, but the two men pushed through. They crossed the finish line in 6:39 and accomplished their goal; they were now members of the Seven Continents Club. Not that Charles had any recollection of what he had just achieved. “The next morning Charles was his old self. We joked and said he will have to go back and run it again because he can’t remember the race,” says Dimitri.

EXPERIENCE OF A LIFETIME
Dimitri describes Antarctica as a desolate place of incredible and strange beauty. “It’s an amazing continent. It feels as if you are on a different planet.” The men stayed for another couple of days, swimming in the icy Antarctic and getting to know the penguins on the different islands a bit better. “We were not allowed to approach the penguins, but if you sit still for long enough, they will approach you and even sit in your lap. It was such an experience.” Every time the men got back onto the boat, they had to put their feet in a trough with antiseptic water. “A big burly Russian grabs your legs and scrubs your shoes to make sure no one brings any germs onto the boat.”

NO STOPPING
For some it might be a once in a lifetime experience, but for 56-year-old Dimitri, the owner of a chain of pizza take-out restaurants, it’s only the start. He plans to run another seven marathons on seven continents. He has already completed a couple of South African marathons. He has run the Lake Tahoe Marathon in North America and will do the Toronto Marathon in Canada in October. “I would like to run some marathons in Nepal or Mongolia as well as in New Zealand.” He plans to be back in Antarctica by 2011, not a bad track record for a man who only started running at the age of 44 after giving up smoking. “The same day I stopped smoking, I started running, mainly because I did not want to gain weight. My first run was horrible, but I persevered and look at me today, I’m still running.”

Running has taught him determination and discipline in all aspects of life. He hardly skips his morning training runs with a group of friends, Elayne Ossip, Josene Groenewald, Linda Potgieter and Dawn Saunders. They run for an hour, increasing distance as they build up to marathons. Dimitri also has his heart set on completing the gruelling Iron Man next year, a race that’s anything but a walk in the park. But if he can finish 42.2km in the coldest, harshest and most remote part of the world, he can do anything.

The Addo Elephant Trail Run just outside Port Elizabeth is a gruelling 100, 50 and 25 mile race run through some of the toughest terrain in off-road running. It’s a race designed to test runners both physically and mentally. A young runner named Hylton Dunn has just conquered the Addo, winning the 50 miler (80km) in a time of 7:53. But running wasn’t always part of Hylton’s life. There was a time when drugs were his only high. Looking at a clean cut and healthy Hylton today, it’s hard to believe this is a man who once slept on the streets, spent time behind bars and stole to feed his addiction.

HYLTON THE ADDICT
It was a time when nothing mattered to him. The only thing on his mind was his next fix, the feeling of euphoria that would make it all go away – the pain, the feeling of emptiness and the burden of life’s responsibilities. Hylton Dunn, a once promising sportsman, was a man possessed by drugs. And it all started so innocently.

Hylton never had any shortcomings growing up in the Dunn family home in Springs on the East Rand. He only knew the best private schools. He went to a good university and had the love of a churchgoing family who adored him. As a schoolboy, he excelled academically and his passion for sports earned him his Free State colours in squash. His father, Grenvil, a chemical engineer and his mother, Jennifer, a stay-at-home mom raised Hylton (29), the second of three boys and his siblings with an abundance of love. Life for Hylton could not have been more perfect. Or so it seemed.

Like most teenagers, Hylton caved in to peer pressure, joining his friends smoking cigarettes behind the pavilion of St. Andrew’s School in Bloemfontein. The ‘wildest’ thing he ever did was having a few drinks too many after the Matric exams. Slowly, Hylton was pulled into a vicious circle of drugs that brought darkness into his life. Friends introduced him to dagga, and by the beginning of his first year as a student at the University of Cape Town (UCT), he was hooked. Dagga became his regular companion. “I started losing interest in my studies and in life. Looking back today, I think it was induced by dagga. It made me feel lazy and lethargic for most parts of the day,” Hylton says.

As a 19-year-old student living in a flat close to UCT, he met a neighbour who introduced him to heroin. Soon, words like ‘scoring some H’ became all too familiar to this private-schooled, once promising young man. He would follow friends into Observatory in Cape Town, where they would snort or smoke heroin. He even started using mandrax, sometimes mixing it with dagga.

Drugs ruled Hylton’s life for nearly five years. “I would use drugs everyday and everywhere, sometimes in between classes and sometimes even in the toilets of shopping malls. That’s all I wanted to do,” says Hylton. Nothing mattered to him, not the way he looked, not the way he dressed and not the people who were close to him, the people he was hurting. After his brother, Kevin, walked in on him and a friend high on drugs, the Dunn family learned the awful truth of their son’s abuse. By the middle of his second year, Hylton decided to save himself the embarrassment of failing, and dropped out of varsity.

His father, who owned his own chemical engineering company, offered him a job in 1999 and he stayed in a cottage at his parents’ home. It was a period of lies, deceit and manipulation. Hylton would regularly take the train from Springs to Pretoria, where he met up with drug dealers. By then, he was so used to mandrax that he barely felt its effects and he moved on to cocaine. “Sometimes, I went to Pretoria twice a day, just to get more drugs. It was a mad lifestyle. I didn’t care about anything. All I wanted was to be high and forget about life.” There were torturous days when he couldn’t get hold of heroin. On these days, he couldn’t sleep or think properly, he felt weak and suffered from body cramps.

Hylton’s entire salary was wasted on drugs. On a quiet day, he would spend no less than R500 and on other days up to R2 000. “I kept missing work and my dad eventually threw me out of the house a couple of times.” He would sleep on the streets, in public toilets or in the flats of drug dealers and pimps. He started stealing from his parents, who had to change the locks on their doors. His dad eventually laid a theft charge against him in a desperate attempt to teach his son a lesson and Hylton spent a couple of days in jail. He got out but was soon back on his path of self destruction. His parents kept on taking him back, hoping their son would turn his life around. “I would promise not to do it again, but I knew I would. I lived for drugs.”

His drug abuse eventually culminated in his arrest in 2001. He would make his way into a block of offices pretending to look for work, but would steal everything he could, from cell phones to money. He got away with it a few times, but was eventually caught and landed up in jail. He got out on a condition – he had to undergo rehabilitation at the Noupoort Christian Rehabilitation Centre in the Northern Cape. Hylton agreed, but knew deep down that he wasn’t finished with drugs. He stayed at Noupoort for eleven months and although he didn’t touch drugs, he longed for them. His relapse came in December 2002, when he went on holiday. Hylton thought he could handle a few drinks over the festive season, but one thing lead to another. By February 2003, he was back on drugs, stealing and sleeping on the streets. Eventually, he was caught stealing a second time. Hylton was back in jail.

“I remember sitting in that prison cell just looking at the four walls and the bars. It was dirty and overcrowded and I was amongst criminals, being attacked and enduring threats of rape. That was a wake up call for me. I realised if I didn’t change my lifestyle, that was how it was going to end for me; locked up in a prison cell, on the streets or even dead.”

Hylton agreed to go back to Noupoort in February 2003, this time determined to change his life forever. One of the driving forces behind this decision was his love for running, an earlier passion that had faded as the drugs began to control his life. He knew he had the ability to run well, but realised if he wanted to make that dream happen, it would have to be without drugs and cigarettes.

HYLTON THE RUNNER
Hylton has always been passionate about sport. He enjoyed running at school and as a 17-year-old, completed the Two Oceans Half Marathon in a time of 1:32. He also excelled at squash, something that fell by the wayside in his first year as the drugs took hold of him. During his first stay at Noupoort, he started running to get fit, remembering how good it made him feel in earlier years. At first, he wasn’t allowed to run alone and had to run with a staff member. “I remember my first run. It was going to be 6km, but after 2km I packed up and couldn’t run one single step further. I had to walk back. I realised then how damaged my body was from the drugs. That was the drive for me to keep going. I wanted to feel good.”

Getting fit was a slow process, but Hylton managed to run every day and completed his first marathon in May 2002. He ran with his dad, who has conquered the Comrades Marathon 17 times. Father and son finished the marathon in a time of 3:45. Hylton was so inspired, he started training for the Laingsburg Karoo Ultra Marathon in September of that year. He completed this 80km race in a time of 7:30, but not without some strong emotions. “I broke down around the 50km mark, thinking of what I was accomplishing after all the abuse I had put my body through.”

Unfortunately, Hylton relapsed three months later and was sent back to Noupoort. Only then did he truly commit to a clean life, in which running was to play a major role. On the undulating terrain surrounding Noupoort, Hylton found solitude and peace within himself. He rediscovered his passion for running and in 2004, completed his first Two Oceans Marathon in a time of 4:19 and his first Comrades Marathon in a time of 8:14. He became so hooked on distance running, he tackled the Addo Elephant 50 miler in 2005. It is run mostly on tracks within the Addo Elephant National Park and is known for its incredible scenic beauty, but also for its unforgiving terrain. “It was a beautiful race, but I didn’t expect it to be so intense. I finished in about 13 hours and was cursing out of anger for not being fit enough.”

Hylton went on to do a second Comrades in 2005, finishing in a time of 10:10, a run he describes as ‘a bit of a disaster’. His fighting spirit kept him going and he persevered. In 2006, he just missed a silver Comrades medal, finishing in a time of 7:38. “I was going up Polly’s and I remember the guys saying I shouldn’t walk, but I did. I missed my silver, but that just gave me stronger motivation and ambition to carry on.” That was Hylton’s last Comrades, as he is against the race being run on a Sunday, but he has put his heart and soul into other long distance runs.

He completed his second Addo in 2006, taking fourth place in a time of 9:30. In 2007, the route was changed and Hylton secured another fourth position in a time of 7:22. This year, the race, which was held on 2 May, was changed back to the original route. In the 50 miler race, 74 competitors entered, three did not start and eight withdrew. In the 100 miler race, 21 competitors started, 12 finished and the rest withdrew. The 25 miler had 48 competitors completing the race. “I set out to win and I believed in myself,” says Hylton. It was only after the 50km mark that he overtook fellow competitors Chris Antonie and Michael Hendricks, both previous winners. “When I passed them, I still felt good and said to them, ‘keep on going, you are going to do a good time.”’ Hylton reached the finish line in a time of 7:53, a course record. “When I crossed the line, I expected to feel emotional, but I was too tired and sore to think of anything.” Michael finished second in 9:13 and Chris took third in 9:53.

Sadly, Hylton is not the only athlete caught in the web of drug use. These five famous drug busts have been burned into the memory of sports enthusiasts.

Name                     Sport designation         Drug used             Date caught

Jennifer Capriati       Tennis player                  Marijuana               1993
Tim Montgomery     Olympic sprinter             Heroin                    2000
Wendell Sailor         Waratahs rugby player    Cocaine                  2006
Tom Booner            Cyclist                            Cocaine                  2008
Michael Phelps        Olympic swimmer           Marijuana                2008

THE WAY FORWARD
Hylton believes running and his faith are what keep him going and free of drugs. “I’m doing it not only for myself, but also to show others there is a way out.” His biggest regrets are making the wrong choices, not finishing his varsity degree and not being the perfect son. However, he is not embarrassed about his past. He prefers to be open about it, hoping that other people can learn from it.

Hylton has set his eye on the Karoo Ultra Marathon in September and would love to win it. When he trains for big races, he does between 160km and 200km a week, including speed work and hill training. After big races,
he cuts down to 10km a day. The highlight of his day includes his two runs, one in the morning and one at night. Hylton, now a restaurant and kitchen manager at Noupoort, says it’s running that ultimately brings him happiness. “If I miss a run, I start feeling grumpy, as if I have missed out on something.”

His parents have been his greatest supporters and through running, he knows he makes his family proud. “The level at which I am competing now is enough to realise that with one small slip, all will be lost.” He sums up his outlook on life: “I have realised that nothing is impossible. Running keeps me motivated, confident and focused. Today, I am stronger because of my past.”

Filipe Da Lomba, Fil to his friends, is a 32-year-old planning analyst at Anglo Platinum, with a degree in accounting from Johannesburg University. All of Fil’s friends say that he is not the man he once was, physically that is. Fil now looks half the size he used to. He recently lost 21kg, which he attributes directly to his running goals for 2009. He is a great character and his success is an inspiration to many. Modern Athlete had the privilege of chatting to Fil to gain some insight into how big his dreams were and how he managed to achieve them.

How long have you been running?
I have been running on and off since 2003, but never took it very seriously. I ran the Two Oceans in 2003, 2004 and 2005 but then went into hibernation until September last year.

How much did you weigh when you came back to running and how much do you weigh now?
The day I started in September 2008, I weighed 89kg, not a pretty sight for someone who is only 1.64m tall. When I lined up at Comrades this year, I weighed 68kg. I lost a total of 21kg.

What inspired you to change your life this way?
After running the Two Oceans in 2005, I promised myself that I would only run again if I lost weight and was in good shape. In 2008, I went down to Two Oceans as a spectator and saw all my mates run, which made me realise how much I missed running. So, I decided I wanted to do it again, but I knew I had to lose the weight. To be honest, I think I was also tired of my lifestyle, so when the club started training in September, I joined them and took action.

How did you do it?
I started running five to six days a week at the running club. I made a conscious effort to run in a school that was at a level higher than I had previously run. I knew that if I merely plodded along at a comfortable pace, I was not going to achieve much. It was pretty tough going at the beginning and I was the last man home on many occasions, but by being consistent and not missing runs, I quickly improved and was able to run with the school. I also set myself an ultimate goal weight and target weights that I wanted to achieve at the start of each race in the build up to Comrades.

How long did it take you to reach your goal weight?
It took around eight months to reach my goal of 68kg.

Did you use a dietician?
No, but I did attend a talk in which one of the speakers, Cara Humphreys, made a lot of sense to me and confirmed that I was on the right track in terms of not going on any crazy diets. She was adamant that the body needs all food groups to be healthy and to perform at its best.

What were the key changes to your eating habits?
The change to my eating habits was not in what I ate but in how much I ate. I looked at what I ate and at what other people ate and what became very apparent was that most of us don’t eat that badly. It’s not like I was having a hamburger every day. What I was doing was eating too much. My portion sizes were far too big. I changed this by trying to have a carb and protein at every meal, while remaining conscious of the amount I ate. Today, a smaller portion has become the norm. Next time you go to a restaurant, look at what they serve you and ask yourself, do I really need to eat all of that? We live in a world of excess; everything needs to be bigger, faster. Food has followed the exact same trend and many of us just consume what is put in front of us without even thinking.

I have become passionate about correct eating habits. I don’t believe in diets where you eat this and don’t eat that (such as the no-carb diet). You cannot sustain a diet like that forever and once you stop, the weight comes back.

What were the key changes in your training habits?
I added in some quality workouts i.e. speed sessions and hill work. I am now a firm believer that in order to improve, these workouts are crucial and that you have to take yourself outside your comfort zone. Plodding along at a comfortable pace is not going to make you faster.

Did you do any training other than running?
I did some gym work but nothing too crazy.

How did you stay motivated?
I trained with a bunch of really great people. When I woke up in the morning, I wanted to get out of bed. The school I ran with also had a weigh-in every Saturday morning after our run. It’s amazing how this motivated me. I did not want to weigh in heavier than the week before in front of everyone. Having a goal weight for each race leading up to Comrades also helped a lot. It split this ultimate goal, which at first seemed impossible, into manageable chunks. When I achieved one of the smaller goals, it gave me the confidence and drive to go after the next one.

We hear you had a bet for Two Oceans. How did that start?
I was at a birthday party and, since a lot of my friends are runners, the conversation turned to running. Andrew, a mate of mine, said there was no way I would break six hours for Two Oceans. My reply was, “You’re right. I’m going to break 5:30.” Since my previous best had been 6:47, he could not resist taking the bet.

It was one of the things that motivated me during my training. It was about proving that I could do something that others thought I could not do. I won the bet in a time of 5:19. I have pictures of me collecting on my bet, but I did not have the money for long as I had to buy everyone dinner that night.

What portion of your improvement would you contribute to your weight loss?
Probably 60% to 70%. I look back and think, how did I ever run 56km at that weight?

Your time improvements in all distances are incredible. You must be very proud of these achievements.
What I am most proud of is not the times, but the fact that I stuck it out all the way to the end. It is so easy to be lazy, but like most things in life, the more you get the more you want. Take Comrades for example. I was disappointed with my time, definitely something I intend working on and putting right, but if I look back, I would have gladly taken that time six months ago. The funny thing is that people say to me, “It must have been so hard.” It was, but the only thing I remember is how much fun and how satisfying it was. I think that a lot of that has to do with the people I ran with.

What is the experience like running ‘higher up’ in the pack during races?
The first thing is your mindset. It’s totally different. You go from trying to survive to chasing certain splits so you concentrate a lot harder. As far as physical exertion goes, it’s by choice that you push. Your body is tired, but you have to keep going. Whether you call it adrenalin or endorphins, there is a special feeling you get when you run fast. It’s like going from point A to point B in a VW and a Ferrari. Both get you there, but the smile on your face when you get out of the Ferrari is a lot bigger.

How has being a fitter, leaner Fil Da Lomba affected your career and your social life?
I have quite a lot more energy these days. I find that when I go into the office after a run in the morning, I feel invigorated and ready to tackle the day ahead, whereas before, I would spend the first hour just trying to wake up and get going. It has also given me the confidence to tackle new things. I now know that if I apply myself and do the work, there is very little that is impossible.

Socially, I definitely have more confidence and am less self-conscious. When you have this extra weight, you tell yourself it’s not an issue but deep down I think you know it is. When you meet someone and they give you a compliment about your new, leaner physique, it makes you feel good and you become more confident.

How do you intend maintaining your weight going forward?
I’ll keep running and exercising, while sticking to my new eating habits. I would like to do an Iron Man triathlon in the next few years. Someone put it quite nicely to me a few months ago: for 31 years your body looked after you; now it’s time to look after your body.

What’s your next goal?
To try and qualify for the Boston Marathon. Whilst Boston may not be as well-known as London or New York, it is a very special marathon in that it has been going for over 100 years and has a very tough qualifying standard. Every person who is at the starting line is a pretty serious runner and needs to do some serious work. You won’t find anyone running in fancy dress at this marathon. In order to qualify for my age group, I need to run a 3:10 marathon. This is an opportunity for me to push myself beyond what I’m doing now, and I’m looking forward to the challenge.

Fil closes off with a fantastic message for our readers.
William Ross Wallace said, “Every man dies. Not every man really lives.” Next time someone tells you that runners are crazy, and asks you why you would want to run, just remember you are doing something that very few others have the ability or the discipline to do. You are really living.