Plea: Let us train
Commonwealth Games 100m champion speaks out about frustration with Athletics SA failing to help with the opening of track so athletes can get back to training
I just don’t understand their thinking
Akani Simbine SA sprinter
● An upset and frustrated Akani Simbine has spoken out against Athletics SA (ASA) for failing to play its part in opening tracks so he and other athletes can return to training.
The sprint star, a mainstay in the world’s top five in the 100m since the Rio 2016 Olympics, has been unable to set foot on a track since the country went into lockdown in late March.
“It’s pretty upsetting,” said Simbine, a member of the powerful Tuks track and field team that boasts most of SA’s 4x100m relay squad as well as upcoming hurdlers Zeney van der Walt and Soks Zazini.
“They [ASA] are not saying anything, they’re not asking us what we need. They’re just quiet,” he told the Sunday Times.
Our livelihood
“This is our livelihood. This is how I make an income. They work in admin, they can work from home. We can’t.”
Yesterday was exactly a month since level 3 directions for sport were gazetted, allowing national federations to submit their resumption plans.
“It’s frustrating for us to see soccer get back to normal, swimming get back to normal. All these other sports and we are just left behind,” said Simbine.
The ASA board decided against submitting a plan, saying it was too dangerous to stage competitions amid the growing spike of Covid-19 infections. Then it told athletes and coaches to make their own plans to get their home tracks reopened for training.
Permission from minister
About three tracks around the country have reopened, but Tuks say they can do nothing until they receive written permission from the minister, as required by the directions.
“At Tuks there are 10 Olympic athletes so you could arrange times so everybody can social distance, but ASA feel that they don’t want to help us in getting back to training,” said Simbine, who is eyeing the rescheduled Tokyo Olympics in 2021.
“At the end of the day we’re going to have to perform next year, but they’re not coming to the party and saying this is how we’re going to help you guys get back to training.
It’s going to be on us
“They’re going to come back to us and say ‘okay, you guys didn’t prepare enough, you guys weren’t ready’. It’s going to be on us at the end of the day.”
Simbine, the first South African to win a 100m Diamond League race, clocked 9.91sec on his season-opener in Pretoria in March.
But now he estimates he is on 30% fitness. “All of that form I had in the beginning of the year — gone!
“I don’t think they understand that the more time we take off, the more time it’s going to take for us to get back and be ready.
“Now it’s three months, four months of not doing anything. It’s going to take a while for athletes to get back by July [next year].
“It’s just about training and being able to prepare for next year. Even now it’s pretty late.”
Simbine, who sits on the athletes’ commission of World Athletics, as the IAAF is now known, said tracks in the US and Italy had already opened up.
“As an athletes’ representative I feel a responsibility to speak up. The athletes are not happy. Everybody keeps asking when are we going to get back, and there’s literally nothing from them.”
At the start of level 4, when asked if ASA was looking at getting top athletes onto tracks, president Aleck Skhosana said Simbine could train on the roads like everybody else between 6am and 9am.
“It’s just a frustrating time,” said Simbine. “They’re putting us on roads where we can get injured and we’re risking more by training on uneven surfaces... than we would be if we actually had to be on the track...
“I just don’t understand their thinking. They came out with their statement that they want to save lives [by avoiding infections], but if you can enforce protocols like the other sports are doing, then what’s the issue?
“Contact sports can start training, but a non-contact sport like track can’t. It baffles me, really.”
ASA have until July 30 to submit plans.