Modern Athlete Magazine Issue 64, November 2014 | Page 4

Ma Editor’s letter PUBLISHERS Mike Bray & Craig Van der Westhuizen [email protected] EDITORIAL TEAM EDITOR Sean Falconer [email protected] JOURNALIST & RACE EDITOR Lauren van der Vyver [email protected] DESIGNER Caroline Collings [email protected] ONLINE EDITOR Rob Squire [email protected] Taking a NEW ROUTE elcome to the 64th edition of Modern Athlete, SA’s biggest running publication. Just saying that in case you’re a first-time reader and are not familiar with our mag. You see, this is an edition with a difference, because for the first time the mag is now available on sale in select retail outlets, and you may be one of our first paying customers. That’s why I love this month’s cover of obstacle racing star Dominique D’Oliveira so much. Her leap for joy at winning a recent Jeep Warrior race epitomises the spirit of the Modern Athlete team – we’re leaping for joy at the way things are going right now! For the last five years, the mag has been distributed for free, sent directly to running clubs and events, with some also going to sports stores around the country where readers could go pick up a copy, but now we are offering the mag for sale in 456 Clicks stores, 36 Sportsmans Warehouse branches, 49 Exclusive Books stores, and a further 1136 independent grocers, which includes various filling stations. That’s a total of 1677 agents – and that’s just for starters, we’re working on more! The mag will remain available for free at our partner events and clubs, such as being included in the goodie bag at the Old Mutual Two Oceans Marathon and Half Marathon, and dished out to all registering runners at the Comrades Marathon. Also, our Digi-mag remains available for free, with the already impressive number of digi subscriptions having taken a massive step upwards in recent weeks thanks to Modern Athlete being the official print magazine partner of the Comrades Marathon, and having a subscription opt-in included on the online entry form for the race. Cue 4000 new subscriptions in just the first two weeks after entries opened! Now, it is just one of those things that people sometimes think that a free publication is automatically of a lower standard than paid-for publications, but we believe that Modern Athlete maintains a high standard of quality, both in terms of writing and design – and the feedback f ɽ