South Africa enjoyed an outstanding day at the continuation of the 16th African Athletics Championships in Addis Ababa and more than doubled its medal tally of the first two days.
The gold medal total increased from one to five while two more athletes, 400 meter hurdler LJ van Zyl and Tsholofelo Thipe (400 meters), booked their seats on the plane to the Beijing Olympics later this year.
The three women high jumpers - Anika Smit (gold), Marcoleen Pretorius (silver) and Marizca Gertenbach (bronze) - made a clean sweep in their event while Van Zyl, Elizna Naude (discus) and the men's 4X100 meters relay team all joined Hannes Hopley and Smit as gold medal winners.
Simone du Toit and the women's 4X100 meters relay quartet also won bronze medals.
It brought the team's medal tally to twelve.
Smit cleared 1.88 meters for the title while her teammates recorded successful jumps at 1.84 meters.
LJ van Zyl, who had an indifferent season, became the fourth qualifier in the intermediate hurdles by clocking 48.91 seconds in a runaway victory. The others, who had bettered the required 49.20 seconds early in the local season were Ter de Villiers, Alwyn Myburgh and Ockert Cilliers. The first two did not travel to Ethiopia while Cilliers only finished fourth behind Van Zyl in a time of 49.93 seconds.
Unless something unforeseen happens in the months ahead, Van Zyl can now consider himself a certainty for the visit to China.
Hannes Dreyer, bronze medal winner in the 100 meters, added a gold to his collection when he helped veteran Corne du Plessis, Sergio Mullins and the Free State youngster, Thuso Mpuang, to a brilliant win in the 4X100 meters relay.
Their time of 38.75 seconds was 0.01 second better than the African Championship record. Nigeria, considered as the favorites for top honors did not finish the race. Du Plessis was a member of the SA foursome who won gold at the 2001 World Championships in Edmonton.
The women's team, consisting of Thipe, Isabel le Roux, Christine Ras and Geraldine Pillay, gave a very good account of themselves by clinching third place in a fast time of 44.28 seconds. Nigeria (43.79) and Ghana (44.12) finished ahead of them.
The 400 meters finals for men and women saw new personal best performances by the two SA representatives. National champions Tsholofelo Thipe (21) and Sibusiso Sishi both finished fourth in their races and lowered their personal bests to 51.49 and 45.84 seconds respectively. Thipe's time was sufficient for the Olympics but the fast improving Sishi, who clocked below 46 seconds for the first time, failed by 0.29 seconds.
Neither Rene Kalmer nor Ruben Ramolefi managed to repeat their form of two months ago. Kalmer crossed the finishing line in the 1500 meters in 5th place with a time of 4 minutes 29.56 seconds - 21 seconds behind Ethiopia's Gelete Burka.
(Xinhua News Agency May 3, 2008)