The recent discoveries of women’s bodies in and around Gauteng have intensified concerns about women’s safety. For some women in Dawn Park, these discoveries have turned an ordinary morning run into a question of safety. With some members of the local fitness community asking themselves, “What if I’m next?”
In response to these concerns members of the Dawn Park fitness community held a 10km memorial run on 20 September to honour the women who had lost their lives in a number of tragic events and raise awareness about women’s safety.
Nokuthula Mlangeni, known as Coach Noxxy (Fat2FitMom_SA), organised the memorial run at the Workout Zone Base Gym after the recent deaths deeply affected women in the local fitness community. The organisers encouraged runners to wear black and pink, with black representing mourning and pink representing love and femininity.
Each Kilometre for a Life
The event carried the slogan “In Her Remembrance”, a tribute to Elizabeth “Tsontso” Moselakgomo. Elizabeth was herself a fellow member of the fitness community whose body was found after she went missing during a jog. Although the run took place on the day of Elizabeth’s funeral, the focus was not on her alone. Rather, the sentiment extended to every woman affected by violence in the country. “We wanted to honour… all women affected by violence,” she said.
The choice of a 10km distance was not random. For the organisers, it carried symbolic meaning. According to Coach Noxxy, the organisers dedicated each kilometre to one of the 10 women they were remembering. “Each kilometre was for one life,” she explained. “We were running for them because they can no longer run.”
On the day, runners wore black and pink. These were the same colours used for Elizabeth’s funeral that day. According to Coach Noxxy, black represented mourning, “for the pain and darkness we are feeling”, while pink represented love and femininity, “for the beautiful souls we lost”.
The tone of the day, as Coach Noxxy describes it, was deeply emotional. “Before the run it was heavy and quiet. During the run it was powerful. We were crying, singing, praying together.” Afterwards, the runners embraced one another in what Coach Noxxy described as a moment of “healing”.
“What if I’m next?”
Although the memorial run was organised in response to recent events, it was not the gym’s first community run. The group previously hosted 10.8km runs every Sunday, but they stopped around April because it was still dark outside at their usual running time. Safety concerns had already begun to affect their exercise routine back then. But the recent discoveries have since heightened those fears as many women no longer want to run alone, particularly early in the morning or along quiet routes. “A lot of them said, ‘What if I’m next?’” says Coach Noxxy. As their coach, hearing those words hurt her.
As a fitness instructor, Noxxy understands those concerns personally. She doesn’t work in the Dawn Park community alone. Sometimes she teaches classes in Buhle Park until 7:30 pm and only arrives home around 9:30 pm after cleaning up. For her, this creates an uneasy dilemma: women choose exercise to improve their health and live longer, yet they must also worry about their safety while doing it. “We’re choosing lifestyles that improve our lives, are helping us live longer, to be more active participants in society, and yet our lives are taken,” she adds.
She describes Elizabeth’s death as a reality check for the fitness community. Elizabeth disappeared on the 9th of September while she was out for an afternoon run in Kempton Park, near her home. Three days later her body was found. That period, explains coach Noxxy “was a scary period” and that it still is because they also run, go to the gym, and are in the fitness industry as well.
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Running in Numbers
While Sunday’s run served as a memorial for the lives lost, it also aimed to raise awareness about women’s safety. As coach Noxxy puts it “We want to be able to exercise, to live, to be free, without fear.”
The gym intends to continue this initiative by organising more runs, encouraging conversations about women’s safety and supporting members of the Dawn Park community. “Our message to the community is simple: We see what is happening. We will not keep quiet. And we will not forget these women. We must protect our women,” says coach Noxxy.
The group has since resumed its Sunday morning runs and opened them to the wider community, particularly women, runners and non-runners. Coach Noxxy hopes to grow the initiative in Dawn Park and encourage people to run in numbers “so that we can be safe.”
On average, between 20 and 30 people take part in the runs, but she hopes those numbers will grow and that running in groups can become fun again, particularly after the recent events.
The group will host the runs every Sunday at 6 am and welcome non-members to join. Coach Noxxy herself has recognized that even when they are running in Dawn Park they sometimes come across a woman running alone. And she insists that “there’s absolutely no necessity for that cause we are one community.”
For Noxxy, bringing runners together is one way of refusing to allow fear to isolate women from their community. The aim now is simple: to grow the Sunday runs and encourage residents to exercise together.
And as the group returns to the streets each Sunday, the message behind the memorial remains: “We want to be able to exercise, to live, to be free, without fear.”
