Notes from 1946
For 6 years through the World War II years, the Comrades Marathon wasn’t run. In 1946 it started again with a field of 22 of which 8 finished.
Winner in a time of 7:02:40 was Bill Cochrane, who had also won the 1935 run. Morris Alexander in his book The Comrades Story notes the irony as ex-prisoner-of-war Cochrane ran past the Oribi camp in Pietermaritzburg “still crammed with hundreds of Italian prisoners” many of whom watched through the barbed-wire fence.
At the back of the field “balding 59-year-old Edgar Marie hobbled on to the track, and around the final circuit, to pass the finishing post with only 2 seconds to spare.”
The cut-off was 11 hours then. So Edgar Marie could be me me this year finishing in the same time but with 1 hour and 2 sec to spare, except I’m not yet balding and I’ll try not to hobble.