After getting his season off to a good start, Adriaan Wildschutt is eager to continue breaking new ground as he looks ahead to the rest of the 2026 campaign.
Wildschutt has established himself as South Africa’s top distance runner in recent years, and he currently holds national record over 3 000m (7:32.99), 5 000m (12:55.20) and 10 000m (26:50.64) on the track, as well as 21km (59:13) on the road.
In his first race of the year, the 27-year-old athlete finished 13th on debut at the World Cross Country Championships in Tallahassee last weekend. He achieved the best ever result by a South African in the senior men’s race, competing at a venue he knew well after racing there many times while studying at Florida State University.
“It was a pretty deep field and I knew we were going to start really fast, so I wanted to get out, which I did so I was happy about that,” Wildschutt said after arriving home with the rest of the SA team on Tuesday.
“It was very hot and humid, which is how Florida usually is regardless of whether it’s winter or summer, but I wanted to compete really hard for South Africa, and our team (in the senior men’s contest) were able to place ninth, so that was great and hopefully we can improve on that in the future. On a personal level I was happy with my performance.”
Looking ahead
Based in the United States, Wildschutt was set to spend the next two months in SA. After some time with his family in Cape Town, he was due to spend five or six weeks at a training camp in Dullstroom before heading back to the US.
Though he wasn’t able to reveal some of the races he had planned later this year, he said he was likely to compete at the New York Half-Marathon on 15 March.
It was also revealed on Tuesday that he would compete at the Absa Run Your City 10km race in Gqeberha on 1 March, where he hoped to run under 27 minutes and potentially reclaim the SA record from Maxime Chaumeton who clocked 26:55 in Romania in October last year.
“It would mean a lot to run sub-27:00 on SA soil, and it would probably be one of my very highest achievements,” Wildschutt told the Run Your City organisers.
About the Author
