Viljoen the only one to book Games slot

AS TIME is running out for track and field athletes to earn places to next year’s Commonwealth Games, they battled in one of the last meetings ahead of the December 31 deadline.

South African javelin throw queen Sunette Xiljoen was the only athlete who managed to add her name to the preliminary list at an Athletics Gauteng North league meeting in Pretoria on Saturday.

Viljoen met the qualifying mark on her second attempt with a heave of 60.84 metres giving her a chance at pursuing a fourth medal at the Commonwealth Games.

Although the distance was almost three metres short of the season’s best she recorded in April, it marked a successful return since she was forced to withdraw from the IAAF World Championships due to a back injury.

The rest of the athletes found it tough to reach peak performance at a time of the year where they are supposed to be in pre-season preparations.

World 200m bronze medallist Anaso Jobodwana made the trip from Durban in an attempt to qualify in the half-lap event after he had already made the preliminary team based on a season’s best 10.16-second 100m he set in Pretoria last month.

Jobodwana’s bad luck in the 200m continued following a wind-aided 20.10 in November while he slipped getting out of the blocks on Saturday.

He finished second behind Luxolo Adams, who won in a time of 20.51 with Jobodwana crossing at 20.85.

“I just have to hope and see if I can run it later on because I’ve had bad luck both times,” Jobodwana said.

“We’ll see. But as long as I qualify, and at the moment it looks like I will make my first Commonwealth team so I am happy about that.”

Defending Commonwealth triple-jump champion Khotso Mokoena missed the qualifying mark by 10 centimetres with a best jump of 16.55m.

Former World Student Games 400m women’s champion Justine Palframan also fell short of earning a place but will have another opportunity in Parrow on December 9.

She won her 200m race in a time of 23.29 well short of the personal best of 22.84 she posted in July.

“I had two weeks off then I had to start again, so you have to work on your mind to actually run fast this time of the season when you are normally in your off-season and you don’t even try to do speed,” Palframan said.

Gena Lofstrand, who made it into the 800m semi-final at the World Championships, missed qualification but vowed to fight to the bitter end to earn a place in the team. She stopped the clock almost three seconds short of the qualifying mark of 2:01.60.