“It is a big disappointment for me that I won’t be able to run on Sunday, but at the moment I am barely able to run 20, maybe 30 minutes, at a time.  Until three weeks ago my training was going perfectly, but then I started to feel a pain in my left hip which continued down to the left side of my knee,” explained Greenwood.

“I had hoped that taking a break from running and doing some cross training instead would help to solve the problem, but as soon I resumed running I started to feel the pain again. I had a comprehensive scan done on Saturday and the result showed that it would be foolhardy for me to try to run the Comrades.”

Greenwood made Comrades history in 2014 when she became the first British female athlete to win. It was a remarkable performance.   With 18 km to go she was eight minutes behind the race leader, but she managed to recover the deficit and win in a time of 6:18:15.

In the last five ‘down-runs’ only Russia’s Elena Nurgalieva was able to run a faster time than Greenwood.

Greenwood’s Comrades ‘CV’ makes for good reading. In her four races she has never finished outside the top ten. In her first race, in 2011, she was 4th (6:32:47); in 2012 she finished 2nd (6:08:24) and last year she was 6th (6:44:03).

The Brit vowed to be back again next year to run the Comrades.

“I keep coming back to Comrades for many reasons.  Primarily I come because it is the biggest, oldest, and most competitive and prestigious ultra-race in the world.  The level of competition is very good and the atmosphere surrounding the whole event is unlike any other ultra.”