Published by the government of Zimbabwe
Collin Matiza
20 May 2008
Harare — IT'S five out of five for Young Talkmore Nyongani!
Zimbabwe's Nyongani reasserted his claim as one of the top sprinters in Africa when he won the men's 400m event at the IAAF Dakar Grand Prix in Senegal on Saturday for a record fifth time in a row.
The 2008 Beijing Olympic Games-bound athlete showed a field of six fellow world-class runners a pair of clean heels as he romped to victory in a good time of 45.97 seconds.
But his winning time, the latest in a string of Zimbabwean sporting successes, was well outside the meet record of 44.29s, which he set when winning the same event in 2004.
It was also outside his personal best time of 44.96s set in Pretoria, South Africa, in 2005.
However, Nyongani, a 400-metre specialist, did well to beat one of the United States' top 400m runners Tyree Washington into sixth place.
The American sprinter came last in the race in a disappointing time of 48.88s and was also beaten by another Southern African runner, Isaac Makwala of Botswana, who came second in 46.36s.
The day certainly belonged to Zimbabwe's sprint star Nyongani whose gold medal-winning performance in this race set tongues wagging in the Senegalese capital.
Nyongani, who turns 27 on September 2, was also pleased with his performance which he said puts him in good stead as he prepares for the Olympic Games in Beijing in three months time.
Speaking to The Herald upon his return from Dakar yesterday, Nyongani said he could have run much faster on Saturday had the weather conditions been better.
"Although the winning time was slow, I was pleased with my performance because it was my first major international race of the year and I used it as part of my preparations for the Olympic Games.
"But the most important thing for me was to go there and be able to compete and winning the 400m title for the fifth time in a row and it's a quite an impressive record.
"I couldn't run faster because the weather conditions were not favourable. It was windy but doing a sub-46 is a good platform for the Olympic Games," Nyongani said.
Nyongani, who is currently on an Olympic Solidarity scholarship aimed for the Beijing Games and is based at the Pretoria High Performance Training Centre in South Africa, said he will run in five more races before heading to Beijing for the Olympic Games.
"I'm going to run in five more races before competing in the Olympic Games. On June 1, I will run in Congo Brazzaville and then definitely I will move to Europe to compete in four more races to fine-tune myself for the Olympic Games."
In Beijing, Nyongani will be representing Zimbabwe at the world's biggest sporting event for the second time in a row after carrying the country's flag at the last Games in Athens, Greece, in 2004.
In Athens, Nyongani performed well below par as he finished third in his heat and failed to proceed to the next round.
But Nyongani, who is now married to Cornilia with the couple blessed with a six-month-old daughter Jaydeen, yesterday promised that "things will be different" in Beijing.
He said he has been working hard under his South African coach Nico van Hardeen at the Pretoria High Performance Training Centre.
"I am under the good guidance of coach Nico van Hardeen and I have the likes of top South African athletes LJ van Zyl and Oscar Pistorius as my training partners."
Van Zyl recently won the 400m hurdles title at the African Championships in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, while double-amputee sprinter Pistorius recently won his case with the Court of Arbitration for Sport to compete at the Beijing Games.
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