adminCaroline Magenga Sports Reporter
ORGANISERS of the Tanganda Tea Half Marathon are expecting a huge turnout at this year’s event with over 500 athletes likely to converge in Mutare tomorrow for the road race.
The event, sponsored to the tune of US$15 000 by Tanganda Tea Company, will be open to all age groups with secondary school pupils, tertiary students, clubs and seasoned athletes expected to feature.
The chairperson of the Manicaland Athletics Board, Joshua Matume, said they were ready to host the annual event.
“This year’s event is promising to be bigger, for instance last year we hosted at least 300 athletes but this time around we have cast our nets wider to include more categories like tertiary and clubs to make the event bigger and more interesting.
“As motivation, we have also facilitated that every participant will walk away with a T-shirt besides the prizes for the actual winners,” said Matume.
Participants have been grouped into senior, junior, veteran (40-49 years), masters (50-59 years) and grandmasters (60-69+years) age group categories.
They will take part in the 10km road race, 2km fun race and wheelchair road race.
He also added that the wheelchair and grandmasters categories were incorporated to ensure everyone was included in the event.
Last year’s winner in the 21km men’s main event, Jonathan Chinyoka, is expected to defend his title.
Rutendo Nyahora scooped gold in the women’s main category.
Meanwhile, the Freda Rebecca Athletics Championships hang in limbo following the club’s failure to source adequate resources to host the event.
Chairperson of the Mashonaland Central Athletics Board Thomas Arabu said the competition had been hit by financial challenges.
“We have been armtwisted to postpone the event to the 26th and 27th of this month due to financial problems,” he said.
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