Kruger conquers Paris — makings of a 19-year-old Games gold medallist

More than an hour after having the Paralympic gold medal placed around her neck, Simone Kruger continued doing interviews and posing for selfies.

Standing on the concourse of the Stade de France, she had postponed a scheduled MRI scan and, by her own admission, “hadn’t looked at her phone much” since the night before, except for a few Instagram stories”. When you’re a 19-year-old that in itself is astonishing.

It could also be termed self-discipline. The teenager who is world champion, world record holder, Paralympic champion and Paralympic world record holder  has discipline in bucket loads. For eight years she and her father Andries did not miss one Sunday making the two-hour round trip from their home in Pretoria to that of her coach Pierre Blignaut.

There is no more Oom Pierre. He died in December and Kruger’s eyes became moist when she faced media and dedicated her women’s F38 discus Paralympic gold medal she won on Friday to him.

Andries has taken up the full-time coaching duties, having shared them previously. Neither could have been prepared for the Paris experience.

Understandably, the special gold medal will take pride of place in Simone’s – pronounced sim-o-nay – bulging cabinet.

“When I get home I’m going to have to rearrange things. I have a lot of school’ medals I’m going to have to sort out to make space for this.”

Perhaps the best advice would be for the teenager – she turns 20 in January and is on a gap year – to invest in a new cabinet. After all, she has a minimum of two more Games’ in her locker and she is a two-time Paralympian. The R400,000 incentive from the SA Olympic Committee is going to come in handy.

Life will start speeding up for the youngster, who has her eye set on studying biokinetics. At age 16 she competed in Tokyo, where she finished fifth in the final with a distance of 31.51m. There Na Mi won gold, and the Kruger of Paris 2024 threw further. The conditions in Tokyo, though, were poor, with rain having arrived and not a towel to dry her hands to apply a grip.

In Paris, Kruger sent the flying saucer 38.70m, only 12cm short of her own world record and the second-furthest ever been launched by a F38 athlete.

We peaked last night,” a relieved Andries said.

“Over the past fortnight we’d have some bad sessions where we haven’t clicked. But you only have to click when it counts.”

The F38 discus class and depth is becoming stacked and there were 14 throwers in the final. Nearly half the Paris field produced distances that would have won a medal in Tokyo. Here, the medals were contested by athletes who were separated by 34cm. Kruger’s winning margin was 6cm.

“Any of us three could have won gold,” the South African starlet admitted in the immediate aftermath.

“But the training and hours paid off. In training we work on a points and rewards system whereby we try to beat each throw and then apply a rewards system to that. I started with 37.69m, then 38.35m and then 38.70m, which fortunately was enough to win gold.”

Kruger’s classification comes as a result of a stroke she suffered while in the womb and left her with cerebral palsy (CP).

“The front left side of her brain was permanently damaged and all the muscles on the right hand side of her body were damaged,” said Andries, who has detailed the story hundreds of times. It also explains why she throws left-handed.

“We had to get experts in to help the muscles reconnect and form new routes to another part of her brain. We dealt a lot with Carina Eksteen at Tuks and Deon Buhrs at Proffessa Health Services, and they were amazing.”

Motivated by the success of her sister, Kruger started her own athletics journey at 12, which included the car rides from Pretoria to Ruimsig that took an hour there and an hour back, and then the training session in between. That was pretty much how Sundays went in the Kruger household.

What happens next is uncertain. The gap year journey is unfolding and Kruger has to start thinking about what to do with her life.

“We’re going to go in a little phase where we’re going to make the body a bit stronger, because she’s not doing so many steps and school stuff and everything. We realise there’s things that have been lacking a bit. So we’ll do a bit of gym in the mornings, and she can build up the body for next year,” Andries said.

The main event on the 2025 calendar is the World Para-Athletics Championships, though the venue remains unknown as hosting bids close in October.

When she stepped out of the tunnel into the Stade de France where 80,000 people raised the roof on Friday night, she looked physically smaller than her opponents. Yet, when it came to business, she was the giant in the circle.

The next line drawn on the grass will be 40m, which means another 18cm ahead of her world record.

“We’ve thrown it in training. The Chinese are emerging as her biggest rivals and they’ve been studying Simone. A coach was watching Simone and he went to his athlete and changed one thing. That athlete is throwing 37m.”

Andries uses the word discipline frequently, and to illustrate what he means he brings up his daughter’s diet.

“Since she arrived in the athletes’ village she hasn’t eaten anything out of line. In a CP world, she might get flu and she might get very tired. That is discipline like you can’t believe. The team management comes to us and they say they cannot give her a sweet. She won’t take it.”

Well documented, too, is the father-daughter-coach relationship between Andries and Simone.

“When she’s at home, I’m dad,” he said.

“You become attached to the whole athletics journey and Simone goes on to the field and starts practising.”

She chipped in: “It helps that we live a few hundred metres from the track.”

Andries continued: “ You never really fully separate the father-daughter relationship when coach. But there is a disciplined side at home, and there’s definitely a coaching side.

“Some days she knows nothing is going to work and the next moment it’s almost my problem. Then we quickly need to decide, how are we going manage this one today? And then we do and then we go on tomorrow. We get there, and we laugh at yesterday. It goes well and then it’s easy. It is really something you need to invest a lot of emotions and personal development into to become a father-coach.

“With cerebral palsy, there are stages where you need to start motivating. If she throws 20m, you motivate. If she throws 40m, you don’t have to motivate. There are times when you stop fixing and you start motivating.”

At the moment no further motivation is needed.