Munyai raring to conquer the world
After dishing out their best performance ever at the World Athletics Relay Championships in Poland last Sunday and winning their first-ever gold medal, Team SA member and rising athlete Clarence Munyai says he just wants more competitions to fine-tune himself for the looming Tokyo Olympic Games.
The South African 4x100m quartet of Munyai, Thando Dlodlo‚ Gift Leotlela and Akani Simbine stunned the world with an emphatic sprinting performance, earning the much sought-after gold medal by nailing Brazil by an inch on the finishing line. They scored their amazing victory by a sheer 0.01 seconds against Brazil.
South Africa’s recordholder Simbine was on the final leg and when he received the baton, his fellow compatriots were in second place, but his lung-busting gallop burnt the track as he stormed to victory.
“I cannot stop thinking about Poland, but I want to compete again and that’s why I’m going to the European season. I want to run more and to prepare for the upcoming Olympic Games.
“I think we will be leaving at the end of the month, it will depend on our Olympics schedule,” he said.
“I do not want to talk a lot about the Olympics yet because that will put pressure on myself, I want to focus on the European season. I’ll be doing individual races there and hoping the guys will be there as well because we work well as a team. The secret is that we trust each other.”
The Limpopo-born Munyai is South Africa’s 200m recordholder with 19.69.
Munyai was disqualified for stepping on the inside of his lane on the curve at the World Athletics Championships in London in 2017.
He was inconsolable in his debut world championships, but his first senior gold medal on the world stage was worth the wait; he achieved it during an Olympic year and will be remembered as one of the four sprinters that made history.