Poor track, terrible times at Naaz meet

Sport
Athletes failed to produce Olympic qualifying times at National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe (Naaz) track and field championships at White City Stadium

LOCAL athletes failed to produce Olympic qualifying times at the National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe (Naaz) track and field championships at White City Stadium in Bulawayo yesterday. RONALD MOYO SPORTS REPORTER

They were quick to blame the use of the cinder track for their failure to produce good times.

The event that was first slated for National University of Science and Technology, but was moved to the below standard White City after Naaz was charged $1 000 to hire the grounds by the university.

Tatenda Musarurwa of Harare, who won the senior men’s 100m event hit the tap in 10mins 66secs while the Olympics standard time is 10mins 18secs. Musarurwa got the better of Nigel Tom, a seasoned independent sprinter, and Nkosilathi Ndlovu of Matabeleland South who finished second and third in 10mins 99secs and 11mins 14secs respectively.

Tom won the senior men’s 400m race recording a time of 50mins 43secs beating Bulawayo and the Midlands’ Tinomutenda Zembe and Godknows Sithole.

“This was my first race of the season, so from what I experienced here I am going back to the drawing board and work on new tactics. There are some senior athletes who were missing who could have brought competition,” Tom said.

“Guys like Conius Mudzingwa and David Tinago did not come. I expected more competition, but the tracks were also bad because we had to compete with a fear of picking injuries, the tracks are hard and the cinder track is naturally slow compared to the tartan track.”

Sparrows Athletics Club of Bulawayo dominated the competition with their juniors coming in the top three in every event although they failed to produce better times.

Andile Khumalo won the boys Under-20 400m race finishing in 51mins 19secs. Khumalo and Tom were far from the 400m Olympic time which requires an athlete to finish the race at least in 45mins 35secs.

In the women’s category, the Midlands’ middle distance runner Enlita Ncube won the junior’s 3 000m race in 10mins 14,69secs. She got the better of Bertha Chika of Harare and Cynthia Taderera of Bulawayo who finished second and third in 10mins 30,95secs and 10mins 47,31secs respectively.

Only long jump, triple jump, javelin, discuss and shot-put saw athletes competing in the field events while high jump did not feature.

Bulawayo, Harare, Matabeleland South, Matabeleland North, Masvingo and the Midlands are the only provinces that participated in the completion.

Bulawayo Athletics Board chairperson Manuel Mpofu said the track and field competitions will continue on March 2 in Harare as the national association will use the competitions to select athletes who will represent the country in the regional super eight.

“I cannot complain about the competition. It was good, but we are hoping that athletes would improve their times as the competition continues in Harare. We are using the results of these competitions to select the team that will compete in the regional super eight competitions,” Mpofu said.