Akani Simbine SA star Akani Simbine will hope to kick off his 100m season in fine style against Ferdinand Omanyala in Gaborone on Saturday. Photo: AFP
Image: AFP
While all eyes will be on Akani Simbine’s duel with Ferdinand Omanyala in the 100m at Saturday’s Botswana Grand Prix, two South African women will be hoping to take the next big step in their careers.
The 400m hurdles pair of Zeney Geldenhuys and Rogail Joseph have been progressing steadily on the world rankings over the past few years.
But they really grabbed the attention of the hurdles world by reaching the semi-finals of the 2024 Paris Olympics, and were unlucky to miss out on a spot in the final.
In fact, Geldenhuys was the ninth-quickest overall across the semi-finals, so she fell just short of the required time to rank eighth.
But she still managed to set a new personal best of 53.90 seconds as she ended in third place in her semi-final – over half-a-second faster than her previous mark of 54.47.
The 24-year-old Geldenhuys’ next target will be Myrtle Bothma’s 1986 South African record of 53.74 – and perhaps Saturday’s event at the National Stadium in Gaborone is the place to do it, having run three 400m and 200m flat races each in recent weeks.
That is because Pretoria-born Geldenhuys will be squaring off with United States legend Dalilah Muhammad, the former Olympic champion and world record-holder, whose personal best is a stunning 51.58 – only bettered by current American superstar Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone’s world-record 50.37 and Dutch speedster Femke Bol’s 50.95.
Another 24-year-old SA hurdler in Joseph also reached the Olympic semi-finals last year, clocking a new personal best of 54.12 to finish third, but not enough to make the final – but she ended as the 16th fastest in the world in 2024, with Geldenhuys 15th.
The Worcester star will be hoping to break through the 53-second barrier this year as well, and will be eager to measure herself against Muhammad.
But the main interest from a South African point of view will be on Olympic relay silver medallist Simbine in the 100m event against Kenyan powerhouse Omanyala.
Simbine will be in confident mood after claiming his first individual medal in the 60m race at a global event in the world indoor championships in Nanjing, China recently.
The 31-year-old – whose 100m national record stands at 9.82 – will also face stiff competition from fellow SA athlete Benjamin Richardson, who has a superb personal best of 9.86.
Just 21, Richardson will hope to make a real statement following his injury at the Paris Olympics, which saw him fall out of consideration for the 4x100m relay team that claimed the silver medal.
Crowd favourite and Olympic champion in the 200m, Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo, will be keen to produce a top-class performance in the half-lap event, where SA’s Luxolo Adams takes his comeback to the next level following last year’s injury issues.
Another Paris Olympic medallist for South Africa, Jo-Ané du Plessis (previously Van Dyk), will compete in Gaborone as well as she prepares for the upcoming national championships in Potchefstroom.
There will be a bit of a blast from the past in the men’s long jump, where former world championship silver medallist Luvo Manyonga will continue his remarkable return to the sand-pit, while two former Commonwealth Games bronze medallists, Ruswahl Samaai and Paris Olympian Jovan van Vuuren, will also be in action.
Other SA athletes to watch out for include Lythe Pillay and Zakithi Nene (400m), Tshepo Tshite and Edmund du Plessis (800m), Kyle Blignaut (shot put) and on the women’s front, Viwe Jingqi (100m) and Miranda Coetzee (400m).
The event will be broadcast live on SuperSport channel 208 from 2.30pm on Saturday.