About 350 locally based athletes from the 10 regions gathered at the Tamale Sports Stadium, to participate in the Ghana Athletics Association (GAA) first National Circuit Championship last Saturday.
The circuit championship is one of the four competitions, that has been outlined by GAA to offer athletes, the opportunity to qualify for the 2017 World Championship and Youth Championship in Bahamas and Kenya respectively.
The women’s 100m race witnessed a big upset, as T.I Amass Sprinter Halutie beat Olympian Dorcas Gyimah with a personal best of 11.75, whilst the 5000 men finals, saw 2016 Milo Marathon winner Malik Yakubu clocking 15:00.94 to come first ahead of Mathew Nantire and Prosper Goku, who placed second and third with a time of 15:03.60 and 15:03.72 respectively.
In the 10000m women’s race Elizabeth Azurre from the Upper East Region made a time of 35:42.76 ahead of Nyarba Precious and Charlotte Fordjour.
In other events, Margaret Simpson made a mark of 11.44 in the Women’s shot Put and Triple Jump category, which saw Precious Attipoe, Samuel Addo and Peter Ackah placing first, second and third respectively.
However, no athlete was able to meet the qualifying standard for the International Association Athletics Federation (IAAF) competitions.
The President of the GAA, Prof Francis Dodoo was impressed about the athletes’ performance adding that, though they couldn’t meet the qualification standards, he believes there will be an improvement on their performance in the subsequent competitions to meet the entry requirements.
The next circuit championship will be held on March 18 in Accra.
GNA/Newsghana.com.gh
