The automatic qualifying standards for the 2023 athletics world championships are so tough that of the 44 men’s and women’s individual events, 13 would require SA records.
Another 19 disciplines have marks that are beyond any performances produced by active competitors to date.
World Athletics recently announced the criteria for the showpiece in Budapest from August 19 to 27 2023, with the window for most events opening on July 31, a week after the championships in Eugene, and closing on July 30 next year.
Qualifying for distance and combined events run for 18 months, with the marathon and 35km race walk applicable from December 1 2021 to May 30 next year, and the 10,000m, 20m race walk and combined events open from January 31, this year until July 30 2023.
And so far SA’s only automatic qualifiers for Hungary are Melikhaya Frans in the men’s marathon, with the 2 hr 09 min 24 sec personal best he ran in Eugene last month, and Zeney van der Walt, who made the time winning bronze at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.
Seven others achieved the 2023 standards during the 2022 season. Akani Simbine (men’s 100m), Carina Horn (women’s 100m), Luxolo Adams (men’s 200m), Wayde van Niekerk and Zakhiti Nene (both men’s 400m), Tshepo Tshite (men’s 800m) and Prudence Sekgodiso (women’s 800m) beat the marks, albeit before the window opened.
There are others who have done the standards as recently as last year. Long-jumper Cheswill Johnson cleared the required 8.25m, Rocco van Rooyen sent the javelin beyond 85.20m and women’s distance star Gerda Steyn has been below 2:28.00 in the marathon.
Ruswahl Samaai, the 2017 world championship long-jump bronze medallist, last leapt into 8.25m territory in 2018, 110m hurdler Antonio Alkana hasn’t been inside 13.28 sec since 2017 and Elroy Gelant dipped under 13:07 in the 5,000m only once, back in 2016.
Male athletes wanting to qualify in the 10,000m, decathlon and 35km race walk, and women looking to get there in the 10,000m, 3000m steeplechase, 100m hurdles, pole vault, triple jump, shot put, hammer throw, heptathlon, and the two race walks will have to beat SA records.
For that do not discount US-based Adriaan Wildschutt in the men’s 10,000m and Tuks prospect Marioné Fourie in the women’s 100m hurdles.
So if the bad news is that automatic qualifying standards are tougher, the good news is there are other ways to win a berth in Budapest, like the world ranking system, which is used to assist in filling up quota spots for each discipline if there are not enough automatic qualifiers.
The allotments for events vary — there are 100 spots in the marathons, 56 in the 800m and 1,500, 48 in the three sprints, 36 in all field events and 27 in the 10,000m.
World Athletics has toughened the criteria in 41 of the 44 individual automatic qualifiers — the only events they eased were the men’s 400m, women’s 800m and women’s javelin — but the flip side is that the allotments are unlikely to be filled by automatic qualifiers.
In 2022, for example, just 34 men clocked the 10.00 sec qualifying mark for the 100m, meaning if that were to be repeated by the end of the window next year, there could be 14 spots available for world rankings and other avenues.
Another way of qualifying is by winning continental titles, though not all of SA’s eight individual African champions from Mauritius in May were given invitations to Eugene, with organisers complaining about low standards in some cases.
Nineteen SA athletes qualified automatically for Eugene this year, though the qualifying window opened a month before the Tokyo Olympics. The other 20-odd athletes selected qualified through the other avenues.
With the 2022 athletics season drawing to a close in the next two weeks, the bulk of SA’s athletes will have to be in top shape next year to win automatic entry into the 2023 world championship team.
The reality is that SA will want as many automatic qualifiers as possible because they will include the even smaller group of medal contenders.
Right now, the track and field team will want to avoid Budapest becoming a fourth consecutive major meet without a podium finish, with the run from the 2019 world championships, through the Tokyo Olympics to Eugene already being their longest medal drought since readmission.
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