The Bulawayo-born athlete, who felt he had made significant rehabilitation progress, will not participate on the advice of his doctors at Mr Price, the South African club to which he is contracted. “The decision for me not to participate in the World Championships came after a meeting with my bosses,” said the 30-year-old.
“I had an ITB (Iliotibial band syndrome) injury just before the June Comrades Marathon. It was a bad injury. I only resumed training three weeks, so I was advised not to run in Italy. Hopefully, I will participate in next year’s edition, when I believe I will have properly recovered. I apologise to friends and family who were behind my trip to the 50km event in Italy.”
ITBS is one of the leading causes of lateral knee pain in runners. It can result from a number of training habits such as always running on a banked surface, inadequate warm-up or cool-down and excessive up-hill and down-hill running. The injury usually takes several weeks to heal.