Claudia Burrough wowed crowds as she crossed the finish line of the Comrades Marathon in her wheelchair; she called the experience amazing.
KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa (29 August 2022) – Claudia Burrough, an endurance challenge regular, travelled from the United Kingdom to take part in the Comrades Marathon. The thing that was most inspiring about her completing the race, was that she did it in her wheelchair.
Claudia loves doing endurance challenges and doesn’t let her ability dictate which challenges she takes on. She loves sports and has set many sporting records by doing them in her wheelchair.
Claudia registered as a Comrades athlete in 2019 with the hopes of completing the 2020 race. As with everything, the event was cancelled due to the pandemic, and many people took to doing it virtually. Claudia was determined to do the race, so she waited for two years.
To really give herself the challenge, Claudia decided not to study the route before arriving. She wanted the entire experience to be a new one, and she didn’t want to stress herself out by it.
This year, the Comrades was a down run, meaning the starting point was in Pietermaritzburg, sloping down towards Durban for the finish. While the route does still have its challenging hills and the likes, it is considered the easier of the two options; the second being from Durban up to Pietermaritzburg.
Speaking to SuperSport, she shared that it was an amazing race and that the hills provided a great challenge. Now she has to decide if she will be coming back to do the up run next year. She took to her Instagram to share what it was like.
“An unbelievable experience from start to finish, the crowds were insane the cheering and screaming was deafening at times. I’ve never not finished a race before and in the lead up I was really worried this would be the one, the hills, the cutoffs and equipment worries. It was tough but ecstatic to finish in 8:35:41 well within the 12 hour cutoff! I spent 89km saying I’d never do it again but the back to back medal maybe too enticing to turn to down.”
Take a look at the moment Claudia crossed the finish line below.
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