Glenrose Xaba credits her stellar year to strong support system

This year, Xaba set a new South African 21.1km record of 1:10:03 at the national road running championships in Limpopo, breaking Elana Meyer’s long-standing mark of 1:10:44 from 1999. 

Xaba now proudly holds national records in the 21.1km, 10km, and marathon events and says her journey is about inspiring young athletes to believe in themselves and follow her path.

"They need to believe in themselves then work very consistently, no skipping training because you feel like you are tired. You need to show up even when you are not very well or you are sick or you are tired. You need to just keep the momentum and come to training and train and focus,” Xaba said.

“So far it is a great year for me, I just thank God that he keeps me injury free and because I work with a good team behind me and I have motivation behind me and I have my coach, she's there for me all the time when I'm struggling mentally to advise me that I need to stay focused because there are women that look up to me so that they can stay motivated all the time."

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The 29-year-old credited Power to Health for keeping her injury-free, and her coaches Caster and Violet Semenya for helping her maintain peak performance. Xaba is confident about defending her Spar Grand Prix women’s 10km series title and believes she is firmly on track to do so.

"So far I just want to thank God and thank the people that I'm surrounded by and my coaches Violet and Caster and the people that I'm working with, Power to Health, that they helping me when it comes to my recovery because when it comes to races, I need to recover very well, so that I can do my best,” she added.

“So far on the series, I've had a great start and so far I'm able to keep the momentum. So, I'm looking forward to defending the title, so far so good."