Following the cancellation of Sunday’s Cape Town Marathon just over an hour before the scheduled 06:10 start, due to adverse wind conditions, the organisers have received many enquiries as to the decision-making process that led to the cancellation.
Some 24 000 marathon entrants and their supporters were denied the opportunity to run – and watch – the 2025 edition of the now iconic marathon, and Cape Town Marathon CEO Clark Gardner says his team is still coming to terms with Sunday’s disappointment.
‘Biggest edition of the race to date’
“After a near-perfect day on Saturday for our Peace Run 10km and 5km events, and our three Cape Town Marathon Trail Races, we were all looking forward to the biggest edition of the marathon to date, with the strongest field ever assembled for a marathon on African soil, and passing stage two of our candidacy assessment to achieving Majors status.
“Our team had worked for months on this event, planning for all scenarios, but a bigger force had the final say, and we once again apologise to all our marathon entrants and their supporters, as well as our
sponsors and partners, that the race was not able to take place.”
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There have been questions asked by both disappointed marathon entrants and the media, given that the weather improved markedly during the course of the morning, leading to speculation that the race could have gone ahead after all. In the spirit of transparency, the Cape Town Marathon team would like to share more details of what happened in the early hours of Sunday, 19 October, eventually leading to the extremely difficult decision to cancel the race.
Summary of events
What follows is a summary of events taken from notes made by the Cape Town Marathon Safety Officer, Phil Prinsloo of Eyethu Events.
He was part of the event’s Joint Operations Committee (JOC), which consisted of representatives from the race organisers, the City of Cape Town’s Disaster Risk Management and Safety and Security portfolios, as well as medical services and the South African Police Services (SAPS).
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00:15 – First reports of high winds at the Race Village (including two start lines and the finish line) in Green Point, as well as at various points on the route.
02:00 – More reports of high winds at Race Village and along the route.
02:15 – Safety Walk inspection of Race Village observes damage at Start in Fritz Sonnenberg Road, with some infrastructure blown over. Damage also observed at Finish, with fencing blown over, and in Hospitality Area, where most gazebos and some furniture blown away. Wind meter readings taken of gusts up to 48km/h.
02:20 – Race organising team begins removing branding on fencing, repairing infrastructure (where possible) and clearing up race venue, in spite of ongoing strong winds.
02:30 – More damage in race venue observed: Stretch tent torn and blown away, Medical Tent brace dislodged. More gusts of 48km/h measured.
02:30 – Race Village officially shut down by safety officials and enforced by security staff. Event staff and volunteers as well as vendors not able to access, pass through or set up in any part of the Race Village, or gain access to equipment or supplies stored in Race Village and scheduled to be dispatched out onto route.
03:00 – Route Safety Team deployed to various sectors of route, report the following through regular feedback to the JOC:
· Sea Point: Fencing and infrastructure at Start in Beach Road blown over or shifted into the road. Period of high wind conditions from 03:00 to 06:30.
· Woodstock: Very high winds experienced, and by 04:30, all signage blown over, and traffic cones blown out of position.
· Observatory & Rondebosch: Very high winds experienced, with gusts of more than 60km/h observed between 03:30 and 04:30, affecting fencing in this area.
04:15 – Report from Start of further infrastructure movement and unsafe situation.
04:40 – Report from Race Village and Observatory that the wind situation has not changed since 02:00, with continuing gusts up to 46km/h. At this stage, nobody is able to predict if or when the wind will subside.
04:40 – Structural engineer reports that he cannot do final certification that the following structures are safe: Start towers on Fritz Sonnenberg, scaffold bridge on Vlei Road, hospitality marquee and shade stretch tents in Race Village, medical tents on route, pedestrian bridge on Vlei Road, main medical marquee at finish.
04:45 – Decision taken by Safety Committee to cancel the event, and JOC authorised the decision.
05:00 – Communication of cancellation goes out to all runners via direct WhatsApp messaging and on social media, urging them not to travel to the start venues. The cancellation announcement is also shared with local radio stations.
05:10 – Further reports of gusts up to 46km/h measured at Race Village and Observatory.
05:15 – Messaging displayed on all VMS boards leading to the city notifying inbound motorists of cancellation.
06:30 – First press release from the race office about the cancellation sent to all media platforms and partners.
‘Safety and welling of individuals and property’
“The Sanlam Cape Town Marathon was managed in accordance with the Safety at Sports and Recreational Events Act (SASREA) of 2010. This Act was promulgated to safeguard the safety and wellbeing of individuals and property at sporting and recreational events in South Africa,” says Prinsloo.
“The Act stipulates that the responsibility for ensuring safety and security lies with the event’s controlling body, organiser or venue owner, through its Event Safety Plan, which must consider all reasonably practicable duties, actions and operational procedures to mitigate the hazards and related risks that might arise.”
As such, the decision to cancel the race required an unanimous decision by all members of the JOC, taking into account all the reports received and the observations, concerns and opinions of a team of highly qualified and experienced people.
Prinsloo adds, “Although the Event Safety Plan endeavoured to balance the likelihood and severity of risks with the amount of energy, effort, time and money required to mitigate these risks, it is important to note that the decision to cancel the race was all about the safety and security of the participants.
“Neither the Sanlam Cape Town Marathon, nor its Abbott World Marathon Majors goals, influenced the decision- making process.”
Safety the First Priority
Even though the cancellation announcement was sent to all runners very soon after the decision to cancel was made, many of the 24 000 entrants were already at the start, or were on their way there.
This saw large numbers of runners converge on the holding areas at the two start venues in Fritz Sonnenberg and Beach Roads.
By the time the sun rose shortly before 06:00, the wind in the Green Point area had dropped noticeably, prompting questions whether the decision to cancel was premature.
“The wind did die down in Green Point around sunrise, but that certainly was not the case on the elevated highway section of the route, nor in Woodstock,” says Gardner.
“The roads in Woodstock and on Main Road were still experiencing high winds until 07:00, blowing our fencing and water table furniture off the roads. We could not guarantee our crews’ safety in setting up
the infrastructure on route at this time, and the vital fencing used to manage contra-flow traffic in some areas was a safety risk. One fence hitting a wheelchair athlete or runner would have potentially caused a serious injury.”
Risks
Cape Town Marathon General Manager Liz Kruger adds, “The Safety Committee experienced first-hand the safety risks associated with the wind in the Race Village, watching tent poles crashing down around them and fences flying across the road, and later they saw fences flying across the road at the Beach Road Start.
“This led them to make a joint decision to shut down the Race Village. Colonel Christo Engelbrecht of the South African Police Services told me that we simply cannot send people into those areas.”
Gardner continues that efforts were made to minimise the number of runners arriving at the race venue once it had been shut down.
“We had MyCiti buses loaded with hundreds of participants at the various Park and Ride collection points and the Cape Town Station, but we ordered the buses to hold there, because the race village was declared unsafe, due to fencing and toilets being blown all over the road and start loading zones.
“Receiving all those runners in the Race Village at 05:00 would have been a safety risk.”
In response to questions about the event’s start and finish infrastructure, Gardner says that there is no truth to speculation that it was either below required standards, or not properly signed off by the event’s appointed structural engineer.
“Our infrastructure, including start towers, bridges and finish gantry, were signed off to safely handle winds up to 60km/h, but the bigger issue was fencing, even those sections with no branding, blowing across our roads and start batch loading areas.”
Here, Kruger adds, “Added to the Race Village, we had quite a few structures on the route, and all structures for the Peace Runs had been declared safe and signed off by our structural engineer before Saturday’s races.
“So, we had to follow the same process ahead of Sunday’s race, and this time the engineer said he could not deem the structures safe. The safety of our crew and suppliers remained paramount, and repair operations were near impossible with the area in lockdown.”
All Options Considered
Throughout the morning, as more reports of dangerously high winds and damage to infrastructure flowed into the JOC, the race organising team and safety committee did discuss alternative arrangements that would allow the race to go ahead.
This included delaying the start and altering the route, says Gardner.
“The JOC did consider a delayed start instead of a cancellation, but decided against it because any decision to merely delay would have meant receiving thousands more runners and spectators into the Race Village, which had been deemed unsafe, and we could not keep the participants loaded in stationary buses for too much longer.
“We had suggested plans to divert all finishers from the Race Village itself by keeping them on Vlei Road to collect drinks and medals, but the bigger issue was the fences being blown across the road and start batch holding areas, posing a danger to runners, spectators and race staff,” he continues.
“Also, starting later would have a number of additional knock-on effects, including many runners then participating during the midday and early afternoon heat, and also shutting down the City for almost the entire day.”
Adding to this, Kruger points out that, “We had planned on two starts, and now one was completely compromised.
“The risk of overloading the remaining start area with 8 000 more people than planned for, would have increased the risk of overcrowding. Even if we had safely managed a single start, the route was not ready for the runners after the damage caused by the wind and our team not having enough time to rebuild the route infrastructure.”
“Then, to finish 24 000 people on Vlei Road, without the large Race Village for them to disperse into, would once again have caused dangerous congestion,” adds Kruger.
“We wouldn’t have been able to get our medical personnel to runners or spectators in need of attention, and our medical facilities had been shut down anyway.
“Therefore, as much as we tried to find a way to delay the start and come up with another plan, we just couldn’t guarantee the safety of our participants, spectators and crew, and that was something that is always paramount to us.”
Change of Date Welcomed
Earlier this year it was announced that from 2026, the Cape Town Marathon will move to a date in May, and Gardner says the experience of this 2025 cancellation makes his team all the more convinced that they have made the right decision.
“This was our third year in a row of experiencing various degrees of wind on the weekend of our event, and we are now ready to host our event in May, with the hope of less wind. Our marathon has a complex route that requires over 16km of fencing, as well as many road closures and a lot of signage, so we are vulnerable to winds that exceed 40km/h.
“We prioritise safety above all else, and that’s what led to the cancellation this year, and our decision to move to May.”
Meanwhile, good news that will hopefully offset some of the disappointment felt by 2025 marathon entrants is that title sponsor Sanlam, while not part of the organisation team or cancellation decision, has announced that it will be offering these athletes a sponsored entry for either May 2026 or 2027.
This offer will be extended to all 2025 Cape Town Marathon entrants, regardless of whether the race succeeds in its bid to become Africa’s first Abbott World Marathon Majors event.
The specifics of this offer, and the entry process that 2025 entrants need to follow, will be announced in due course.
Furthermore, the Cape Town Marathon team will soon be announcing a special campaign, in conjunction with its sponsors and partners, where 2025 marathon entrants can still earn their 2025 Cape Town Marathon medal.
More information will be shared on the event’s social media channels and via direct communication to these entrants once finalised.
Lastly, there is no news yet regarding the effect the cancellation of the 2025 race will have on the candidacy of the Cape Town Marathon becoming an Abbott World Marathon Majors (AWMM) race.
The event was close to passing the second phase of the candidacy process, and thus being able to announce that the 2026 race is one of the world’s Majors.
“We met with the Major assessors a few hours after the cancellation decision and they complimented our team on the way we handled a really tough situation,” says Gardner.
“I am still hopeful that it’s just a matter of time before we get to announce that we are a Major. In
the meantime, we will pick ourselves up from this disappointment, and do our best to ensure that we put on the best race possible next May,” he concludes.
For more information, send an email to media@capetownmarathon.com or visit www.capetownmarathon.com.
