South Africa has welcomed the two medals won by Team South Africa on Saturday in the long jump at the IAAF World Championships in London, England.
Luvo Manyonga and Ruswahl Samaai grabbed gold and bronze medals, respectively to put the Rainbow Nation’s foot forward in the global contest for decorations.
Aleck Skhosana, the president of ASA said that together and his board, they are proud of what they have achieved so far.
“Congratulations to Luvo and Ruswahl for their outstanding personal achievements and putting South Africa on the map as lead players in the event. They are on top of the world and no one can take it away it from them.
“We also applaud the work put in by their respective coaches and Team SA support teams for all work done to make the environment possible for the athletes to achieve what they have.
“We also recognise the spirited performances of most of the athletes to keep the flag flying high, but in competition anything can happen. We are obviously hoping that athletes who are still in competition will contest fiercely to reach podium positions because what we are celebrating is not enough. Good luck to all remaining athletes,” Skhosana said.
On Monday from 19:30, Team SA sees Wayde van Niekerk, Akani Simbine and Clarence Munyai in the 200m Men heats, while at 20:30 Wenda Nel contests 400m Hurdles Women heats and at 22:50, Caster Semenya battles for a podium place in the final of 1 500m Women.
Wayde van Niekerk added World Championships 400-metre gold to his trophy collection with a consummate victory in London on Tuesday night.
Starting in lane six, Van Niekerk was second quickest to react to the gun, only American Fred Kerley quicker, but the Bloemfontein bullet always looked in control, despite a threat from Steven Gardiner of the Bahamas in the final bend and won in 43.98sec.
Van Niekerk countered that threat with the greatest of ease though and still looked able to even relax over the last 50m as he won in 43.98sec.
His winning time was almost a second outside his Olympic and world record time of 43.03 he ran a year ago this month.
But conditions were on the cold side and not suitable for world record times… and there’s the small matter of a possible 200m victory coming up in the next few days with the semi-finals being run as soon as Wednesday evening
Gardiner took second in 44.41 with Qatar’s Abdalelah Haroun a surprise third in a super finishing sprint down the inside with a personal best time of 44.48sec.
Van Niekerk’s 43.98 victory means that Michael Johnson’s World Championships record still stands, set in Seville, Spain 18 years ago.
In other Sunday evening action South African record holder Antonio Alkana failed to break through to the final of the 110m hurdles.
He was off in heat three and ended fourth in 13.59sec as Hungarian Balazs Baji won in 13.23. Also going no further than the semi-final was 100m sprinter Carina Horn. With a personal best of 11.06 she would know that it was going to take a superhuman effort to make it into the final.
Kindly follow us on twitter:@AfricanVoice2
