Harry Botha

A 71-year-old who only started running seriously following his retirement at the age of 65. Prior to retiring, Harry had never run further than 15km. However, he ran his first marathon in Berlin in 2008, followed by running the ‘World Marathon Majors’ over a two-year period, i.e. the Berlin, London, New York, Boston and Chicago Marathons. In October 2011, Harry set a marathon PB of 4:53:12 in Venice before deciding to turn his attention to running marathons on different continents. He successfully completed the Great Wall Marathon in China in April 2012 despite the fact one-quarter of the race field did not reach the cut-off time. He also achieved the non-running feat of climbing Mt Kilimanjaro in July 2012. The Antarctic Ice Marathon will be another marathon milestone in Harry’s amazing quest to completing marathons on all seven continents. He says that running has made his retirement a pleasure by meeting wonderful people in different countries around the world. He thanks his wife for her support and understanding and he regrets the worry caused to her while away training in the early hours of the morning or while travelling to distant shores.