From being bored to being best
Scott-Efurd took her mother’s advice to heart.
When Dominique Scott-Efurd stood on the start line of a race for the first time, she did so out of sheer boredom, and while she has had to work hard to display her tremendous potential, the 26-year-old athlete has since blossomed into South Africa’s best long-distance runner on the track.
At the age of seven ScottEfurd would tag along with her mom, who was a cross country coach, to school races on Friday afternoons.
“I was always so bored and just dying to go home, so my mom said: ‘If you’re so bored, why don’t you run?’.”
The following week she lined up for her maiden race, and though there was no spark to indicate the talent she held within, Scott-Efurd had enough fun to make it a regular outing.
“In that first race I stopped and ate jelly beans along the way, so I wasn’t even trying to compete,” she recalls.
“But I kept it up, and slowly but I wanted to do better and I became more competitive.”
In her first year of high school she broke the five-minute barrier (5:00.00) over the 1 500m distance in her first track race, prompting her mother to find her a coach.
Joining a training group mentored by former middle-distance star Johan Fourie in Stellenbosch, Scott-Efurd soon realised two sessions a week were insufficient to achieve her potential, and she moved to Rhenish Girls High School in order to be closer to her coach.
By Grade 10 she had dropped all other sports in order to focus athletics, and in her final year of high school she dipped under 4:30.00 in the 1 500m event.
Her performances in her matric year were enough to earn Scott-Efurd a scholarship at the University of Arkansas, and it was on the collegiate circuit where she really made heads turn, holding her own against some of the most promising distance runners in the world.
Having graduated in 2015 with a degree in marketing, she married American Cameron Efurd and opted to remain in the United States, turning professional in 2016.
Though she has been contropic versially omitted from multiple national teams in recent years, Scott-Efurd remains loyal to her nation of birth and she continues to represent South Africa at international level.
And while it has been a long process, she has become revered for her consistency, setting personal bests nearly every time she steps on the track.
In the 5 000m event, she has improved her best time every year for the last five seasons in succession, and after clocking 15:04.14 in Heusden-Zolder in July 2018, she seems destined to become the second South African woman after former Olymon medallist Elana Meyer to break the 15-minute barrier.
Despite not having many opportunities to compete over the longer distance, Scott-Efurd’s personal best of 31:51.47 also places her second behind Meyer in the national all-time 10 000m rankings.
In addition, Scott-Efurd boasts a 10km personal best of 32:22 on the road, and though she has not yet broken an outdoor record, she has cracked every South African middle-distance mark on the indoor surface.
After visiting her family in Cape Town over the festive season, Scott-Efurd has stuck around to participate at the national cross country trials in Pretoria next month where she aims to qualify for the World Cross Country Championships in Aarhus, Denmark in March.
And with her sights set on a possible 5 000m/10 000m double at next year’s Rio Olympics, she hopes to continue making steady improvements over the next few years.
“Both my parents (Mike and Renee Scott) were good athletes, so obviously I have some talent, but when I started running I wasn’t the best from day one. I’ve definitely had to work for it,” Scott-Efurd says.
“That’s my story and I don’t think I would trade it for any other.”