Caster, Luvo look to shine bright like diamonds in Zurich
JOHANNESBURG: Two of South Africa’s newly-crowned world champions, Caster Semenya and Luvo Manyonga, will be looking to extend their impressive unbeaten runs with Diamond League titles.
The dynamic duo will spearhead South Africa’s charge with six more of their compatriots featuring in the first of two finals in Zurich tonight.
Treble world champion Semenya could claim an unprecedented 20th major victory in a final on the trot and retain the Diamond Trophy she won last year.
Semenya has not lost a single two-lap race since 6 September 2015, at the ISTAF Berlin meeting.
Manyonga, in turn, will be looking to finish his season having gone unbeaten for a year since finishing second at the Rio Olympics.
London world championship long-jump bronze medallist Ruswahl Samaai and 100m finalist Akani Simbine will also be in action.
Simbine will be looking for some sort of redemption after he had to be content with a fifth-place finish at a major championship for the second consecutive year.
The speedster will line up against reigning world champion Justin Gatlin of the United States.
Simbine and Gatlin are the only two 100m finalists from the world championships that will line up in the Diamond League race.
Long jumpers Manyonga and Samaai will be joined by former national record holder Khotso Mokoena, who is the only other South African who has won a Diamond Race season title.
Semenya will once again line up against perennial challenger Rio Games and London silver medallist Francine Niyonsaba of Burundi and former world champion Eunice Sum of Kenya.
The 800m final includes five of the finalists from the world championships including Canada’s Melissa Bishop and Kenya’s Margaret Wambui.
South African men’s 400m hurdles record holder, LJ van Zyl, considers the Zurich Diamond League final as his world championships after he was controversially left out of the national team for the global showpiece, despite meeting the IAAF standards.
He believed he would be able to dip below 40 seconds in his penultimate race of the season.
Van Zyl’s roommate in Zurich, Pieter Conradie, meanwhile, will feature in the 400m final after double champion Wayde van Niekerk pulled out of the race due to a persistent back injury.
Conradie had to travel from the far side of the world to get to Switzerland after flying to Taipei for the World Student Games where he was scheduled to race yesterday.
The jet-setting one-lap sprinter arrived in Zurich on Tuesday after spending five days in Taiwan, where he received news that he had earned a lane in the final.
Female 400m hurdles ace Wenda Nel will round off the South African contingent where she will be lining up in a non-Diamond League race.