Germiston Stadium hosts provincial champs

Central Gauteng Athletics hosted the final league of the 2024 CGA Track and Field season on February 24 at Germiston Stadium.

Over 1000 athletes participated in the league to better their times to qualify for the National Track and Field Championships.

In the men’s U20 javelin event, Ettienne Smith of Jansen won with an impressive throw of 58.95.

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The second position went to Grant Barnes of Germiston Callies throwing a distance of 42.60. Settling for the third position was Linda Mbonani of Waterfall City throwing 25.61.

The girl’s U16 long jump event was dominated by Oluchi Ndubueze of IHT with a jump distance of 5.72m to secure her gold medal position. The athlete has dominated this event in her age group since her days as a sub-youth athlete.

The silver medal position went to Anna Mart Viljoen of Kempies with a jump of 5.08m.

The bronze position was won by Tayla Vorster of MVAC, landing 4.90m.

The senior men’s high jump saw UJ dominate the event with Gayisa Maswanganyi claiming the first position with a 2.05m jump.

His teammate Justin Louwrens came second, jumping 2.00. In third position, also in the UJ colours, was Ntandoyethu Ndaba with 1.90.

In the sprints there was a very interesting competition among the 200m athletes, which was dominated by the famous Lythe Pillay in the UJ colours, clocking 21.14.

The second position was secured by Matthew van Rooijen of FFA who clocked 21.20. In the third position was James Tshiyombo of Tembisa in the time of 21.54.

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Among the favourite events of the day was the senior men’s 5000m event which had a trail of more than 17 athletes on the starting line and featured the likes of Precious Mashele, Nkosinathi Sibiya and Marko Bucarizza.

There was tight competition between Phemelo Ntoe, Nkosinathi Sibiya and Precious Mashele with Mashele in the lead for the 12 laps of the event.

Unfortunately, things took an unexpected turn for Mashele as he was overtaken by Ntoe in the final two laps to win the event, clocking 14:25.01. Ntoe’s teammate, Nkosinathi Sibiya, took the second position in the time of 14.42.87 and settling for the third position was Marko Bucarriza of Born to Run.

“We now turn the focus to hosting the 2024 Track and Field provincial championships with the CGA U16/18/U20/U23 provincial championships taking place over two days from March 8 to 9 at Germiston Stadium.

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The provincial senior championships will take place on March 16 at UJ Auckland Park Athletics Stadium,” said CGA Track and Field chairperson Maggie Dicks.

“Now the province must ensure our athletes are well prepared for national championships and other major international championships such as the upcoming Olympic Games later this year,” said Dicks.