Modern Athlete Magazine Issue 123, October 2019 | Page 4

EDITOR’S LETTER Runners, Writers, Colleagues, Friends PUBLISHERS Richard Laskey Roxanne Martin Sean Falconer ADVERTISING SALES Richard Laskey 083 342 8200 / [email protected] DIGITAL SALES & CAMPAIGNS Roxanne Martin 072 368 7390 / [email protected] EDITORIAL TEAM EDITOR Sean Falconer [email protected] DESIGNER Caroline Collings [email protected] DIGITAL CONTENT MANAGER Roxanne Martin [email protected] My job as Editor is to finesse what they produce so that it has the Modern Athlete look and feel, and fits in with the overall goal of the magazine, which is to entertain, inform and inspire readers. We aim to give you a good read that just makes you want to lace up your running shoes and hit the road, trail, track or treadmill, and I am lucky enough to work on many articles that achieve that... because quite often I, too, just want to lace up and head out the front door after finishing an edit. Just take for example some of the articles in this edition. Manfred Seidler chatted to Olympic 10,000m track star Dominique Scott (page 52) and SA international trail runner Jock Green (page 40), and when I finished subbing these articles, I picked up the phone to tell Manfred how much I had enjoyed the reads. He has been working in the running industry for well over 25 years, and he has a goldmine of running information locked in his brain. We often get chatting on the phone and just like that, an hour can go by. Thank goodness for WhatsApp calls, which are way cheaper than conventional phone calls! Similarly, I love working with Peter ‘PJ’ Moses, whose transition from Cape Flats gangsta to reformed father, writer and shoe retailer is now well known. He continues to inspire me just through his journey, let alone his writing. A few years ago when I interviewed him for the mag, he told me he was doing a writing course and aspired to become a published writer. Call it a gut instinct, but I decided right there to offer him a column in the mag, without having seen any of his work, and he just blew me away with the quality of his writing. Soon he was writing feature articles as well, and this month he caught up with well known Cape-based race walker Adam Papier (page 36). I love that PJ has proven me right. Another highlight of each month is choosing which one of Stuart Mann’s blogs I will use in the mag. It is always a tough choice, because they’re all so entertaining, and that’s why I decided to use two this month, since he ran two very contrasting races in Dundee just a few weeks apart. His two-part article starts on page 20 and is once again well worth the read, because few can write race reports quite like The Running Mann! Sean Falconer 4 Follow on Twitter: @sean_falconer | Follow the mag as well: @modern_athlete ISSUE 124 me OCTOBER 2019 / www.modernathlete.co.za COVER IMAGE Jetline Action Photo IMAGES Photo Agencies & Professional photographers: ABPhotoZA, Alfred Thorpe/Vuurtorin Media, Anthony Grote, Bigstock, Chris Hitchcock, Clarisse Henriques/ITU Media, Ewald Sadie, Janos m. Schmidt/ITU Media, Jetline Action Photo, Kody McGregor, Kyle Cestari, Mark Sampson, Rogan Ward, Roger Sedres/ImageSA, Shawn Benjamin/Ark Images, Terence Vrugman, Tobias Ginsberg, Val Adamson Non-professional photographers: Bridget Linderoth, Blake Wilkins, Sean Falconer Courtesy: Anel Oosthuizen, Carla Farina, Cape Town Marathon, Comrades Marathon Association, Izimangaliso Malatjie, Linda Doke, Murray & Roberts Running Club, Pinelands Athletics Club, PJ Moses, Philippa Dods, Randall Crisp, René Kalmer, Roelof Mostert, SABC, Sean Falconer, Su-yen Thornhill, Stuart Mann, Victoria Falls Marathon, Xoliswa Lebethe, and various Race Organisers FIND US GENERAL E-MAIL [email protected] EDITORIAL E-MAIL [email protected] WEB www.modernathlete.co.za FACEBOOK www.facebook.com/ modernathletemag TWITTER @modern_athlete INSTAGRAM @modernathletemag Modern Athlete is accredited by the ABC with an average monthly circulation of 79,344 (Apr - Jun 2018) O ne of the perks of this job is that I get to work with a talented group of passionate running writers on each edition. These are contributors to the mag who run or walk regularly themselves, or work in the running industry and are involved in various levels of the sport. In other words, they know what they are talking about. EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTORS Regulars: Anel Oosthuizen, Christine Peters, Derick Marcisz, Ernest Hobbes, Manfred Seidler, Norrie Williamson, PJ Moses, Ray Orchison, René Kalmer, Roxanne Martin, Sean Falconer, Stuart Mann, Tom Cottrell Guest Writers: Ayanda Tshiluvane, Carla Farina, Esmé Maré, Izimangaliso Malatjie, Keith Buhr, Philippa Dods, Randall Crisp, Su-yen Thornhill, Xoliswa Lebethe