Athletics: Special Events One competition-Rose and Bristol double winners |30 January 2012

Only a handful of the country’s athletes turned up for Saturday’s Special Events One competition at Stad Popiler and the organisers had to scrap six events off the programme – women’s 60m, women’s 300m, women’s and men’s long jump, and women’s and men’s 1,000m races.

 Not even one of the country’s track and field gold medallists at the last Indian Ocean Island Games (IOIG) held at the same Stad Popiler took part in this first event.

Among the top athletes present Saturday was male sprinter Danny D’Souza – the 100m silver medallist at the IOIG. He ran unchallenged in the 60m race, winning in 7.04 seconds.

D’Souza’s record over the 60m distance is 6.93 seconds and he set it on February 14, 2009 when he blew by his five opponents – Leeroy Henriette, Carlos Marianne, Yannick Vidot, Travis Monthy and Carlos Ernesta – with ease and was all on his own as he powered to the finish line in a new Seychelles senior electronic time. On that day, he removed five hundredths of a second off the previous best of 6.98 seconds clocked by Nelson Lucas on March 3, 2000.

Jadel Créa won the men’s 300m race in 38.70 seconds ahead of Kevin Harryba (39.52). Harryba only decided to get into the starting blocks of the 300m race after the 1,000m event was called off.

On the field, Ronny Bristol and Marie-Helen Rose, both shot put gold medallists at the 7th Jeux de la Commission de la Jeunesse et des Sports de l’Océan Indien in Reunion in 2010 – took two wins apiece in the shot put and javelin events.
Junior competitor Bristol won the javelin throw with a best distance of 40.31m, relegating Stephen Souris (youth – under 18) into second place with a performance of 36.60m.

Bristol had no opposition in the shot put, winning with a best effort of 13.12m.
Like Bristol, Rose, who ranked fourth in the Young Female Athlete of the Year 2011, was also unchallenged in the women’s shot put event and her performance of 11.65m was enough to give her victory.

In the javelin throw, she was challenged by Aica Cushion, but again won with a best distance of 34.70m. Cushion finished second with 29.60m.

The only other event that went on was the male high jump dominated by Leeroy Gamatis who cleared the bar at 1.80m. Stephen Souris was second with a height of 1.65m.

In the Special Events competition, local athletes compete in shorter distances, presenting them with the opportunity to once again showcase their talents and fine-tune their techniques before they line up for normal events that feature on the Seychelles Athletics Federation calendar.

G. G.