10th African Junior Athletics Championship in Gaborone, Botswana-Labiche grabs silver and bronze |19 May 2011

Labiche and the rest of the Seychelles team returned yesterday morning from Gaborone.

High jump gold medallist at the ninth championship in Mauritius two years back with 1.69m, Labiche settled for the silver this time with 1.70m – 9 centimetres short of her Seychelles record of 1.79m set in July 30, 2008 at the Stad Popiler.

Egyptian Mohammad Basan Mousaad won the event’s gold medal with a height of 1.81m, breaking Egypt’s senior and junior records.

Moroccan Daunia Menni was ranked third for the bronze medal with 1.65m.
In the heptathlon contested by six athletes, Labiche was third overall to win the bronze medal with a total of 4,663 points – 173 points less than the total of Egyptian Haris Radwa Faty (4,839 points. Nigerian Kemi Francis was second with 4,836 points.

“I’m happy with my performance despite not retaining the high jump gold medal won in Mauritius in 2009,” Labiche told Sports Nation.

“I was a bit tired because I also had to do the heptathlon and winning a bronze medal is quite a good achievement,” added the 18-year-old.

Labiche’s performance of 6.00m in the long jump of the heptathlon earned her the Seychelles junior record, improving Joanna Hoaureau’s old best of 5.92m set here on June 4, 1998.

Had she competed in the long jump, she would have won the gold medal as South African Samantha Pretorius won the event with 5.90m.

Labiche’s results in the heptathlon contested over two days were as follows: 100m hurdles 15.59 seconds (3rd for 765 points), high jump 1.72m (1st for 879 points), shot put 9.85m (3rd for 520 points), 200m 26.17 seconds (2nd for 782 points), long jump 6.00m (1st for 850 points), javelin 24.99m (5th for 373 points), and 800m 2:47.15 6th for 494 points).

The results of the other Seychelles athletes were as follows:

Matty Molta: 100m – 13.57 seconds in heat 1 and 13.24 seconds in the semifinals; and 200m – did not start;

Joanne Lou-Toy: 100m – 12.55 seconds in heat 4, 12.48 seconds in the semifinals and 12.88 in the final to finish 7th out of 8; and 200m – did not start;

Nerry Luc: long jump – 6.41m to finish 10th out of 16.

Marie-Helen Rose: discus – 30.03m to finish 8th out of 9; javelin – 36.28m to finish 6th out of 9; and shot put – 10.85m to finish 8th out of 12.

Carlos Marianne: 400m – did not start; and 200m – 23.23 seconds in heat 5, 23.02 seconds in the semifinals.

Ronny Bristol: shot put – 14.19m to finish 7th out of 11; and javelin – did not start;

Leeroy Gamatis: high jump – 1.90m to finish 9th out of 9.

Carlos Ernesta: high jump – did not start after twisting an ankle in warm-up.

Alvin Kilindo: triple jump – 13.43m to finish 15th out of 17.

South Africa dominated the championship with 34 medals – 13 gold, 13 silver and 8 bronze. Ethiopia finished second with 17 medals – 6 gold, 4 silver and 7 bronze, while Egypt took third place overall with 11 medals – 6 gold, 2 silver and 3 bronze. Hosts Botswana finished 14th with one silver and seven bronze medals.

G. G.