She made South Africa proud by clinching a bronze medal at the World Athletics Championships in Beijing last year. But Sunette Viljoen will look to go two steps further at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
Javelin thrower Viljoen just missed out on the gold at the “Bird’s Nest” stadium last year when she was leading after the fourth round with a distance of 65.79, but then Lyu Huihui of China pulled out a 66.13 in the fifth round, before German Kathrina Molitor pushed Viljoen into third with a winning throw of 67.69.
But that mark is certainly not out of reach for the 32-year-old Viljoen, whose South African record of 69.35m, set in 2012 in New York, ranks her as the sixth-best javelin thrower of all time, with the world record at 72.28 by the Czech Republic’s Barbora Spotakova.
Viljoen clinched her 11th South African title at the national championships in Stellenbosch last month, but her winning mark of 59.39m was well short of the Olympic qualifying standard of 62.00m.
But the top athletes are hard in training to time their peak to perfection for the Rio Olympics in August. Viljoen, though, would want to kick-start her season with a good throw at the opening Diamond League meeting taking place in Doha, Qatar on Friday, with Molitor also participating.
Another motivating factor for Viljoen this year would be the memory of missing out on a medal at the 2012 London Olympics, when she came fourth in 64.53m.
Viljoen will be one of six South African athletes taking part in the event, along with Dumisane Hlaselo (1 500m), Antonio Alkana (110m hurdles), Victor Hogan (discus), Caster Semenya (800m) and Wenda Nel (400m hurdles).
Semenya was the best athlete of the competition at the SA nationals in Stellenbosch when she became the first athlete to win three national titles – in her instance the 400m, 800m and 1 500m – at one meet.
The 2009 world champion in the 800m repeated the treble at the SA Student Championships in Polokwane at the weekend, and has been in top form over the last two months.
Semenya is still deciding on whether she will do the 400m and 800m at the Olympics, but will hope to be pushed in her specialist event in Doha, as she hardly had any competition in South Africa.
Her season’s best of 1:58.45 in Stellenbosch was an excellent time so early in an Olympic year, but she told Independent Media recently that a time around the 1:55 mark is likely to result in Olympic gold.
The Doha Diamond League meet, at the Suhaim bin Hamad Stadium, will feature some of the top athletes from around the world in the shape of Americans LaShawn Merritt, Aries Merritt and Christian Taylor, as well as Kenyans Asbel Kiprop, Ezekiel Kemboi and Brimin Kipruto, and among the women, Jamaican sprinter Veronica Campbell-Brown and Kazakhstan’s Olympic triple jump champion Olga Rypakova.
@IndyCapeSport - Independent Media