History of the event The PE City marathon has been run on a number of different routes in and around Port Elizabeth since the early 90’s and has always been a major event on the Eastern Province Road Running calendar having been run as the SA Marathon Championships on a few occasions. The race was originally started by Charlo Athletic Club in the early 90’s and was taken over by Crusaders Athletic Club in 1996 when it became the Bonnita PE City Marathon. When local dairy company Bonnita was taken over by Parmalat in 1999, the race was renamed the Parmalat PE City marathon and continued as such until international problems forced Parmalat to withdraw as sponsor in 2005. Despite approaches to a number of different companies in 2005 and 2006, no sponsorships were forthcoming, and Crusaders were forced to carry the costs of staging the race themselves until 2007 which saw Aspen Pharmacare come in as race sponsor until 2018. Crusaders Athletic Club welcome KFC onboard as the flagship sponsor in 2019. The race has, since inception, always started and finished at Kings Beach, Port Elizabeth. However, in 2004, due to increasing traffic volumes and residential developments, Crusaders decided to move the race to the relatively quiet residential suburb of Lorraine which is close to the outlying, ‘rural’ smallholdings on the edges of PE. This has provided both a safer, faster and flatter route. An added benefit is that the race – due to the fast, flat course and the time of year – has attracted increasing numbers of up-country runners looking for a fast qualifier for the Two Oceans and Comrades. An ASA (Athletic South Africa) requirement for any event over 21km is that at least a 10km is run in conjunction with the main event so this race also has a 10km event which starts just after the main race. Due to the increasing popularity of this race, our provincial association Eastern Province Athletics has accorded EPA Championship status on the race since 2012 to present which means that the race is used as a qualifier for admission to the provincial athletics team. The race venue for 2012 was moved from Lorraine Primary School to the NG Kerk Lorraine, which is right next door to the school, so directions to the venue remained the same as did the route. It was decided for 2019 that due to the growing numbers of participants that the venue be changed once again and a decision was subsequently made to have the newly branded KFC PE City Marathon start and finish at the African Sky’s Venue in Theescombe Port Elizabeth. Crusaders Athletic Club in partnership with KFC are looking forward to hosting the event and also welcoming all who are hoping to tackle either of the races.