Comrades Marathon 2025
Published: 27th Jun 2025
Because of its broad appeal and the number – 23 000 is the maximum allowed – and diversity of its participants, the Comrades is regarded as a key indicator of the popularity of running shoe brands in SA. Runners, who have to register by early December for the race in June the following year, are asked to fill in the brand and model of their shoes, which is the source of information for the Comrades count.
We asked 3 running shoe specialist retailers, 3 running shoe brands, and the official running equipment retail sponsor to comment on this year’s results. Asics, New Balance and Mr Price Sport didn’t respond.
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Johannesburg, Gauteng, SA – The count is probably an accurate reflection of the intentions of the entrants when entries closed on 17 December 24, but it also throws up an oddity: Specialist running shoe retailers I have spoken to will tell you that Asics is the number 1 running brand, but Adidas is definitely not number 2 in their s ...moreTechnically, all the brands have good modelsPretoria, Gauteng, SA – Well it's always difficult to say how accurate the count is because it's done in November, 7 months before the actual race day. So it's not done physically on the day, and it can change over that time. For example, people can change brands because they aren’t working anymore for them and also a lot of b ...more
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