International runners will impart knowledge to Port Elizabeth athletes
Sophia Chenge and Bihro Adhena will also spend some time exploring the sights and sounds of the Bay over the next few days
A pair of Ethiopian road runners will spend the week training with some local athletes as they look to pass on their knowledge and experience of preparing for international competition.
The young women were catching up on some training under the watchful eye of their athlete representative Bradley Agnew on a slightly windy Tuesday morning.
Sophia Chenge (27) and Birho Adhena (18) arrived in the city a little over a week ago, and have already participated in the FNB Cape Town ONERUN 2019 where Chenge finished in third place, while Adhena claimed the win in her age category.
Agnew, who is an IAAF accredited athlete representative, said the exercise was in order to build a platform for local athletes to have the opportunity of training and learning alongside the best international athletes in the business.
“The idea, specifically with the roadrunners, is to bring international athletes to the Bay and hold camps, which allows for our local talent to be exposed to their ways as an athlete.
“The Eastern Cape has a generous pool of talent, however they don’t have mentors who can help with extracting that talent in order to bring out the best in our own athletes,” Agnew said.
Agnew, who together with business partner and life-long friend Lee-Roy Newton, run the Newton Sports Agency, said the exercise was the first visit for the young women, to get use to conditions but also to get comfortable in travelling outside of Ethiopia without their coach.
Agnew said the end goal was that the programme will blossom into something whereby they can facilitate athlete visits on a more frequent basis throughout the year.
“The group was supposed to consist of four athletes, two men and women, I specifically speak about ladies because because I feel in South Africa, our women’s sport is not leading as it should be.
“We have the talent pool, it’s just they are not given enough exposure, even in Port Elizabeth, we have a deep pool of talent who just needs one opportunity to learn from the top athletes,” Agnew said.
Agnew said both Chenge and Adhena have run at national level back home, have represented at various age levels, with the exception of senior level.
“Ethiopia is not shy of talent, they [Chenge and Adhena] have represented their country at various age levels except senior just yet, in their country they are emerging, but on the world stage, they are elite runners, which speaks to the depth of running in the country,” he added.
With this just a trial run for future events of the same nature, Agnew said it was still a work in progress at this stage. “How we envision it working is to have them coming out three to four times a year, various athletes.
“Currently we are working with Ethiopia and Kenya, because that is where some of the best road runners are sitting at the moment.
“The thing is, people want go and train in either of these countries because of the high altitude, this can be an expensive exercise, but also, you need to have people down there who can create those kinds of opportunities down here.
“However, if you reverse it and bring four or five athletes down here, it opens up that opportunity to a lot more people,” Agnew explained.
Furthermore, Agnew explained that future visits would be arranged alongside major events on the South African athletics calendar.
“This would give us a better opportunity of working, not only with athletes but also athletic clubs and various coaches, who can also pick up a thing or two on international training methodologies from those athletes we bring down,” he concluded.
Agnew said they would try and arrange one or two sessions with some local clubs this week before the pair take on the Spar Ladies Challenge in Cape Town at the weekend.
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