JOHANNESBURG – Providing a new home to some of the country’s best road runners, the Murray & Roberts Running Club has managed to lure a strong group of elite athletes.
The club announced its elite team in Johannesburg yesterday boasting some of the country’s top distance and ultra-distance athletes, including former Comrades Marathon champions Charne Bosman and Caroline Wostmann.
The construction group stepped up to the plate shortly after KPMG announced in September 2018 that it would not renew its sponsorship of the running club three years after it had launched.
The majority of KPMG’s elite athletes will be running in the black and yellow colours of the Murray & Roberts team.
The newly-launched club has also adopted the Vorentoe Running Academy, which will form part of the club’s development squad.
Charne Bosman winner of the women 2016 Comrades Marathon has also joined Murray & Roberts. Photo: Muzi Ntombela/BackpagePix
During the official unveiling of their club colours for the 2019 season, the club also made a surprise announcement by introducing Bosman as one of their marquee signings.
“It is a recent decision, it is a decision I only made at the beginning of this year, but I am very happy with where I am now and it was time to move on,” Bosman said. “I am very grateful for what Nedbank has done for me and I am looking forward to 2019. I am a veteran but age is just a number. I am going to give it my best and sometimes you need to change in your life to do better.”
— Charne Bosman (@charnebosman) January 10, 2019
Murray & Roberts club manager Dana Coetzee said the “seven-figure deal” was initially set down for five years but a sell-by date has been removed. “Wow is all I can say about Murray & Roberts. Forty-eight hours after we first visited them, they said 'yes' to launching the team,” Coetzee said.
“I have a small budget for retainers and we were looking at a maximum of 20 elite men and 20 elite women.”
Sisters Rene and Christine Kalmer and 2015 Comrades champion Wostmann are among the former KPMG elite athletes to have found a home at the new club.
The club also has rising marathon runner Nolene Conrad and 2017 Spar Women’s Grand Prix champion Kesa Molotsane on their books.
Former SA champion Benedict Moeng and Comrades gold medallist Rufus Photo are two of the elite men at the club.