dyton mupawaenda
Ellina Mhlanga-Senior Sports Reporter
SEASONED athletics coach Benson Chauke says they are hoping for the best as they intensify their build-up for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
Chauke is in charge of marathon runner Isaac Mpofu’s training for the Games. They have worked together before.
Mpofu earned his ticket to the Olympics when running 2 hours and 6 minutes 48 seconds at the Valencia Marathon in December 2022.
The qualifying time for men’s marathons is 2 hours 8 minutes 10 seconds and 2 hours 26 minutes 50 seconds in the women’s section.
“It’s everyone’s desire, as a coach or an athlete, you would want the athlete to one day be there. You would want to have worked with someone who in the history of the country would get there.
“Our desire has always been to do our best. If the podium is achievable the better. But looking at Isaac’s times 2:06, the Olympics, and the World Championships are not won by any times that are far from that time.
“So if we can run such times in other races, we are just praying that on this day we might also give them a good show in terms of the times, 2:06, maybe this year it might be even faster, maybe a 2:05. But Isaac is not very far from this time.
“So he is within range, it’s there. So the desire is to do your best and probably attempt to get there. If you don’t, but you will also want to be in the top five, maybe top 10 or top eight,” said Chauke.
Some of the athletes Chauke has worked with before including Cuthbert Nyasango, who made the top 10 at the London 2012 Olympic Games when crossing the finish line on position seven in 2 hours 12 minutes 8 seconds.
“The discipline in the two is the same, the focus, the hunger to do well is there in the two. Nyasango is a more endurance person whereas Isaac is more of a powerful but speedy guy, no wonder why his times are way ahead of what Cuthbert was able to achieve at the Olympics.
“At both Olympics and even the World Championships you realise this one is faster maybe training methods have changed, a lot of improvements, and a lot of legal supplements and stuff. Things have changed.
“So as we go for this one, we are looking at what everyone else is doing. Where they are, and the training patterns. Try as much as we can to read, try as much as we can to use Isaac when he goes for competition to mix and mingle, and try and extract that which, makes these other people that have always been there, what make them get there.
“Then we try and look at what we are doing and where we need to change and these are the things that we have been looking for.
“So we are hoping that even as we continue this time around we should be able to make certain changes and to make the body tolerant to the pain that it experiences on the day of competition in practice, so that when we face it there, it’s not something new.
“It’s something the body already knows and it will adjust and can hang in until the finishing line,” said Chauke.
Mpofu is camping in Harare and is being supported by the National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe and the Zimbabwe Olympic Committee.
Online Reporter