'I'm excited about the new journey' - Kyla Jacobs on joining Boxer and World Athletics 5km Champs

Following Murray & Roberts' decision to withdraw their sponsorship, many of the running club's top runners went in search of new homes. The latest to leave the black and gold army is Kyla Jacobs who has joined the Boxer Athletic Club. Known for recruiting track athletes and 10km and 21km specialists, it comes as little surprise that the reigning SA 5000m champion has decided to join the likes of Glenrose Xaba and Cacisile Sosibo at Boxer.

"I'm happy to run for Boxer for the first time today," she told #TheTopRunner moments after taking sixth place at the Hollywoodbets Durban 10k in a new personal best 32:59. "We've got such a strong group going. I'm excited about the new journey. They've been very supportive so I'm looking forward to running many new PB's and I'm looking forward to representing Boxer."

Kyla Jacobs is now running in the colours of Boxer Athletic Club. Photo Credit: Hollywoodbets Durban 10k.

By taking seventeen seconds off her 10km lifetime best on Sunday, the 29-year-old underlined her excellent shape ahead of the inaugural World Athletics 5km Road Running Championships in the Latvian city of Riga at the end of September. Jacobs will represent South Africa in that competition after finishing as runner-up to Tayla Kavanagh at the Athletics South Africa 5km Championships which took place in Johannesburg in June.

"We've been consistent in our training and I've had a couple of good workouts which has been encouraging. We've made good progress and we've been healthy," explained the Capetonian who ran a 15:20.61 5000m personal best back in April. But more important than her good physical conditioning will be her state of mind going into that major global competition.

Jacobs has represented South Africa before and is looking to do so again at the inaugural World 5km Championships. Here she is pictured at the 2022 African Championships in Mauritius where she took seventh place in the 5000m. Photo Credit: Supplied.

In May the woman who represented the country at the World Cross Country Championships in Australia at the beginning of the year, travelled to Europe for a few 5km road races. Although she came away with a personal best of 16:21 in Germany, she had been aiming to run faster. Jacobs says travelling and racing in Europe brings with it its own challenges which she will now be able to draw on during the race in Riga.

"In Europe I didn't have exactly the season I was hoping for. I got a very bad blister with the first race so it was a bit touch and go for the first 5km road which I won, but I was hoping to run a little bit faster. Then I unfortunately picked up food poisoning for the last race in Europe. But you learn out of all of those experiences. SO I'm excited to run in Latvia and test the body. I'm hoping to run a good time."