Elana Meyer has just completed the most successful four weeks of her career
ATHLETICS: Julian Drew
ELANA MEYER, South Africa’s most successful athlete, finally struck gold last weekend to put the cherry on the top of a highly rewarding season.
Her victory in Oslo in the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) world half-marathon championships provided the climax to the most productive four weeks of her career which started with her winning the Commonwealth Games silver medal over 10 000m in Canada and then the World Cup title in London over the same distance in a new African record. In Oslo Meyer set a championship record for the thrice-run event of 68:36 but that time is still only her third fastest over the distance.
For Meyer these achievements carry even more significance because just a short time before embarking on her medal-collecting spree she was contemplating whether she shouldn’t write off the rest of her season.
That she sought the advice of a medical specialist in London where she was based was fortunate for her and South African athletics. A blood disorder was diagnosed and quickly put right but it perhaps came too late for her to perform at her best in the Commonwealth Games as she showed when running a minute and a quarter faster for 10 000m just over two weeks later in London.
While her world half-marathon title, her first in an IAAF world championship event, does not carry the same weight as a world or Olympic track title or the world cross country championships, it came in the event where she was always most likely to do well.
Three years ago when Meyer was confined to the roads of South Africa, Iulia Negura of Romania, the athlete whom Meyer beat into second place in Oslo by 39 seconds, was winning her second successive world 15km title in a time of 48:42 in a closely fought race. Three weeks after Negura’s achievement in those championships which were changed from the 15km format to the present one of 21.1km in 1992, Meyer scorched to a solo world best performance for 15km of 46:57 at the Ohlsson’s SA 15km Champion- ships in Cape Town.
It was at a time when Meyer reigned supreme on the roads at sub-marathon distances; she also had a world best of 67:59 for the half-marathon from that same year in East London, but the diminutive Stellenbosch athlete never got her chance to clean up the titles she could have won with ease. On her return to international competition she focused on the much more competitive disciplines of track and cross country and the titles eluded her although she still proved herself to be among the very best in the world.
While the performances of the Chinese and her own failure to complete the 10 000m final at last year’s world championships in Stuttgart may have rattled her, the achievements of the past month will have gone a long way to restoring her belief that a major track gold medal could still be hers when the world championships take place in Gothenburg next year.
It may well be her last attempt at a major track title after her successful marathon debut in Boston in April paved the way for her to move up to that distance at the Atlanta Olympics.
The biggest question mark against her realising her track ambitions will be whether the Chinese re- emerge from nowhere again to produce super human performances that leave mere mortals in their wake.