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Manuel Mpofu

Harare Bureau
HARARE province lived up to expectations yesterday when they emerged winners of the National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe Inter-provincial track and field championships at the National Sports Stadium B Arena.

The two-day event saw all provinces competing and Harare got 57 medals, including 23 gold, to come out tops.

The hosts, with 65 athletes, went into the event eyeing the top spot and they just did that when they dominated most of the events, including the seniors and juniors relay events.

Emerging star Ngoni Makusha picked gold medals in the 100m and 200m.

Harare province coaches coordinator, Collen Makaza, was pleased with the performance and attributed their victory to team work.

“We had to divide our coaching team. I was specialising in middle distances while we had other coaches working on sprints, jumps and throws to prepare our team.

“I am happy we came first. We fielded athletes in every event from throws, sprints, middle-distances and jumps. I think our team was the best. We had the advantage of being home and other teams I think they were affected by travelling,” said Makaza.

The seasoned long-distance runner said they are now looking forward to the JM Busha triangular series final on May 25 and the Southern Region championships in June.

On second place was Bulawayo with 15 medals and having fielded 15 athletes only, Bulawayo Athletics Board chairperson Manuel Mpofu expressed satisfaction with the outcome.

“The main idea was to bring our athletes here not to defend the championship but to to make sure that they qualify for certain events. And I believe today most of my athletes from Bulawayo they made a mark.

“The athletes themselves, they were posting good times especially 100m, I enjoyed (watching) Ngoni Makusha and Itai Vambe (Harare) and there is Nigel Tom (Bulawayo) he posted good time as well. So really the competition was superb,” said Mpofu.

Masvingo came third with nine medals and Mashonaland West with 19 medals were beaten to fourth position because they had few gold medals.

Mashonaland Central and Matabeleland North were fifth and sixth respectively while on seventh place was Mashonaland East.

Manicaland came eighth, followed by Midlands and Matabeleland South finished on the bottom.

The national association were using the meet as the final selection event for the Southern Region Senior championships in June as well as the African Junior championships in Algeria from June 29 to July 2.

They are also looking at the IAAF World Under-18 championships in Nairobi, Kenya from July 12 to 16.

Several athletes ran qualifying times for the world Under-18 competition during the Cossasa meet recently and NAAZ are now waiting for confirmation from the international federation.