Olympic Profile: Rene Kalmer

Event: Women’s Marathon (42.2km)

Age: 31

From: Central Gauteng

Personal best: 2:29:59 (Yokohama, 20 November 2011).

Season best: -

First Olympic Games

Rene Kalmer competed at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, China in the women’s 1500m on the track, but this year she will be one of the three women’s marathon runners representing South Africa at the Olympic Games in London.

Major Events

In 2009, Kalmer finished 15^th with a time of 70:37 at the World Half Marathon Championships in Birmingham, Great Britain.   Two years later she represented South Africa at the World Marathon Championships where she finished 31^st overall, in a time of 2:38:16.  Kalmer has finished in the top five in various marathons over the years including wins at the Soweto Marathon in 2009 and the Jackie Gibson Half-Marathon in Johannesburg in 2011.  She finished fifth in both Prague and Yokohama in 2011.

 This season

Kalmer has won every 10km race she competed in from March to the end of June which includes the Cape Gate Vaal, Hartebeespoort Dam, Spar Grand Prix races in Cape Town and Port Elizabeth, as well as Durban.  Her best time was 32:50 at the Spar Grand Prix in Cape Town.

She also won all four half marathon’s she competed in.  On 29 January she won the Johnsons Crane Half Marathon in 75:24, followed by the Two Ocean’s Half Marathon on 7 April where she crossed the line in 75:02.  She won the SA Pork Kwai Challenge in Randburg on 13 May in 76:18 and then set a new course record at the Gifu Seiryu Half-Marathon in Japan. She won the race in 73:02, clocking her best time of the season.

She served as pace maker at the London Marathon on 22 April but did not finish the race.

On 9 June, Kalmer competed at the Waterberg Executive Mayor’s 28km in Modimolle, and won the race in 1:44:29

Back in time

Kalmer started her professional career on the track competing in the 1500m, 3000m and 5000m and has even tried the 800m.  Her fastest time in this event was 2:03.51.

Schedule

Women’s marathon: 5 August at 11:00

Rene appeared on the cover of Runner’s World in March 2012. Read our interview with her here. 

Meet the rest of the SA athletics team.