Swimming star eyes more success
PORT Alfred’s Zukisani Nikelo feels at home in the water and at his happiest competing in swimming galas.
Recently Nikelo competed in the Masters Swimming Championship in East London where he performed well and brought home two bronze medals, one in relay and another in 200m breaststroke.
Nikelo, born and raised in Port Alfred, taught himself, with help of his late cousin, to swim at Kiddies Beach, when he was a young boy and has since then, always enjoyed swimming as a pastime.
In September, Nikelo joined Aquabears Swimming Club in Port Elizabeth, and has been competing in galas and every swimming event where possible, since then. Nikelo, a former pupil of Nomzamo Secondary School, said it was unfortunate there were no opportunities for swimming competitions in Port Alfred and Ndlambe, outside of school sport.
Dedicated to his sport, Nikelo practises every day at the Port Alfred High School pool, “thanks to the kindness of Roger Nock”. He also regularly practises at the Port Alfred Indoor Swimming Pool Centre.One day, Nikelo wants to be a world champion.
“My body feels great, I eat healthy, I live healthy and I feel good,” he said.
Nikelo said he would be happy to see more young people engage in swimming, or any other sport, which would help them refocus their attention and get them off the streets. He would love to represent Ndlambe competitively in swimming, as he knew of many talented swimmers from the area who had to go elsewhere to join clubs. “Port Alfred has good potential for a swimming club. I don’t know what is holding us back. It must be for all people, and all races,” he said. Nikelo said there were a number of competitions scheduled in his calendar, and he looked forward to his first gold. In the interim, competing in competitions often came at a price and Nikelo is looking for sponsorship.
“I just want to also say thank you to Lesley from Rosehill SPAR who didn’t hesitate to help me in terms of accommodation and food to help me compete in East London,” Nikelo said. April 4 are Ocean Basket.
Rounds 3 and 4 of the Renee Vroom Singles will be played on April 12. The Men’s Handicap Singles will be played on the same day but in the afternoon. Good bowling to all participants.
We also wish good bowling to our Men who entered the Eastern Areas singles to be played on April 9.
Duties for the week, April 4 to 8: Tabs – Chris Armitage and Rosemary Wood, Bar duty – Dave Lang, Gordon Goch and John Bennett, Ironing – Noel Heale.
Last Tuesday on the public holiday we did not start bowls at 10am but stuck to our normal afternoon play and played our Megabucks competition with a full green.
The fourth place in the competition was shared by three teams all on eight points – plus four shot profit. The winner of the Megabucks was Rod Gradwell’s team of Mike Beaumont, Theresa Coetser and Neville Westcott with a 10-point full house score and plenty of shot profit in defeating Rob Owsley’s team.
In a much closer game, Sieggie Rohrs’s team took most of the points for a nine point and six shot profit to take the runner-up position against Lee Botma’s team.
Last Thursday we played two games of our club mixed trips competition, with one game being postponed to be played before the next scheduled round playoff.
Then the tabs day competition was Snowball with four additional rinks being filled. Of these, three of the games ended with a onepoint shot difference and the other having a six shot difference.
Snowball is not about the team with the biggest score winning the day. We draw four ends for the day and then a score is drawn. We had two teams with a score of “9” which does not happen very often with the big numbers, so the competition rolls over to the next round and the kitty grows.
On Saturday we had normal tabs bowls and the last round of our Club Men’s Open Singles played. In Section 2, Dave Thomas defeated Neville Westcott and in Section 3, Jacques Krige defeated Mike Pfotenhauer and Rob Walker defeated Allan Sheridan.
The three section winners are: 1 Keith Kolesky, 2 Dick Schuurman and 3 Jacques Krige, who will play in a three-way final on April 8. Tabs bowls played the Snowball competition and the winning score drawn was “0” for the four ends of the day and there was no team with the correct score for the day and the kitty will grow for the next time.
Sunday was an extremely busy day at our club with all three leagues (Men 1st and 2nd and Ladies) taking place, with 96 bowlers on the greens all day. After four rounds of the ladies’ league, Port Alfred A are at the top with a full eight points followed by Albany, with Kenton B in third place and Port Alfred B fourth. Then the rest of the league are on two points each.
The Men’s 1st League after four rounds has Albany on top with 19 points followed by Kowie and Port Alfred on 18 points (PA have played all the games) and followed by Grahamstown and Kenton on 14 and 11 points respectively.
The Men’s 2nd League is very tight after five rounds with Albany on top 28 points, 2nd – Kowie 25 points, 3rd – Kenton 24 points and 4th – Port Alfred on 23 points.
This one could really go to any club. The final round of the Men’s and Ladies’ Leagues will take place at Kenton on Sunday.
Duties for the week April 3 – 9: Greens – (Roll) Pieter Stegmann, (Mark) Stan Richter and Robert Sandiland, Tabs – (Cash) Jacky Watson, Bar – Jonine McFarlane and Don Munro.