Athletics holds meet as prep for nationals

ATHLETICS Papua New Guinea held a short event yesterday for the distance and sprint runners at the Sir John Guise Stadium in Port Moresby in preparation for the PNG Air National Athletics Championships from Dec 9-11.
Federation president Tony Green said the meet was to give the athletes competition time as well as preparing a team for the World Cross Country Championship in Australia next February.
The event included a 400m and 1,500m race with appearances by elite athletes including distance runner Siune Kagl, sprinters Benjamin Aliel, Leroy Kamau and Terence Talio – who just returned from the United States.
“We have the male members of the distance squad here in Port Moresby, to give them some competitions before the championship,” Green said.
“We’re trying to sharpen up their performance, give them some race experience because they’ve been training for quite a while so we brought them for some competition.”
The 400m race saw Aliel finishing first with a time of 47.9 seconds followed by Adolf Kauba and Leroy Kamau who finished second and third respectively.
“Benjamin Aliel came back after a period out of the sport for a couple of years. He ran very well with a 47.9s for 400m which a very good time for him.
“Adolf has been training at the National Sports Institute in Goroka. He came second today to Benjamin which was a very good 400m race for him.
“We’ll have some more races for the sprinters this weekend.”
Green added that a 5,000m and an 800m event is scheduled for tomorrow morning with a few more competitions lined up for this weekend before the national championship next week.