South Africa’s chances of winning any medals at the 11th IAAF World Junior Athletics Championships in Beijing this weekend reached a glimmer of hope on Friday when three of the stars of the 2005 World Youth meeting in Morocco showed their class.
JP Hofmann (shot put), Simoné du Toit (discus) and high-hurdler Louw Smit all progressed in their respective disciplines.
Hofmann, winner of the gold medal last year, easily progressed to the final while Du Toit, who had already finished fourth in the shot, went through to the discus final in which she had won silver in 2005. Their respective distances were 19m and 50,32m.
Du Toit, who will find the medal hunt quite tough, has a good chance to improve on her own South African junior record of 53,07m set earlier this year.
Smit, fourth in the 2005 Youth final, impressed with a personal best time of 13,86 seconds and stands a reasonable chance to survive Saturday’s semifinals of the 110m hurdles.
Smit’s teammate Lehann Fourie failed to match his earlier times of the year and was eliminated with a disappointing 14,25 seconds.
South Africa’s main hope for one or even two medals is in the men’s javelin final, which will feature Robert Oosthuizen and world youth champion Noel Meyer on Saturday.
South African teams will also be in action in heats of three of the four relay events. The meeting ends on Sunday when the women’s discus, 110m hurdles (men) and all relays will be on the programme. — Sapa