Olympics postponement could help Caster Semenya’s 200m quest

The postponement of the Tokyo Olympics should help Caster Semenya’s unprecedented quest to drop down from the middle-distance events and qualify for the half-lap sprint, according to her former coach, Jean Verster.

The Games were supposed to take place in Japan in July, but the global Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak has forced the International Olympic Committee to announce that it will now hold the quadrennial event at about the same time next year.

The delay coincides with what can be interpreted as either a desperate or a daring move by Semenya, the reigning Olympic 800m champion, to qualify for the 200m for the Olympics, a journey that began with her winning the event at the Gauteng north provincial championships with a time of 23.39 seconds.

Semenya’s decision comes in the wake of her inability to defend her Olympic title because World Athletics’ new eligibility rules exclude her from doing so (or from competing in the 1 500m, an event in which she won bronze at the 2017 World Championships) unless she suppresses her testosterone levels.

It’s a call Verster feels might work, especially with the time she now has on her hands.

Read: Virus puts Olympic swansongs

“I think the fact that the Olympics have been moved back a year is actually in her favour, because it gives her another year to work on her speed, power and explosiveness. These are all the components she needs to work on more as a sprinter than she would have had to as an 800m runner.”

Verster, who coached Semenya to the 2016 Olympic title, has little doubt that the superstar could make the 22.80s time she would need to qualify for Tokyo.

“I haven’t worked with her for quite a while, but having worked with her for close to four years, I do know that she’s got a lot of natural speed.

“Obviously, she doesn’t have the kind of speed top sprinters have, but sprinting is also something you learn and get better at. I’m not a sprints coach, but you can save a tenth or a couple of hundredths in your 100m and 200m times just through your start.”

As convinced as he is that Semenya will qualify, Verster wasn’t sure where that would lead once she made it to Tokyo.

“My gut feeling is that she probably could qualify, but I just have no idea how far she can go. To get to the Olympics is one thing, but to get through the rounds is another.

“I don’t know if she’s fast enough to get into something like a semifinal or a final. Knowing how she thinks and how competitive she is, I’m not sure she’d be fine getting there and not being competitive.”

Looking at the changes Semenya needs to incorporate into her training to go from being an endurance runner to a sprinter, Verster said they probably weren’t as drastic as some might imagine.

“The interesting thing is that, over the past decade, the 800m, both for men and women, has changed,” he explained. “It’s not so much a middle-distance race any more as it is a long-distance sprint. It’s kind of the 400m pushed further.

“So, because of that, our training is such that you need a lot of speed and explosiveness.

The training allows for a lot of that kind of work anyway. If you can run 49 seconds in the 400m, a race I think she can run in about 48 seconds, there’s no way you can’t run a 22-something in the 200m.

“I wouldn’t say the sky’s the limit for her because, if you medal in the sprints at the Olympics, you’re a special athlete. That’s why this extra year to prepare is so important for her. Also, with her, you never know.”

Verster said the speed endurance training Semenya would have done in training as a middle-distance runner should also help her when it came to maintaining the quality of her sprints through the qualifying rounds.

Asked if it would have been better for Semenya to pursue the 5 000m rather than the sprints as she is already a middle-distance runner, Verster said that that distance was probably a bridge too far for her.

“A couple of decades ago, the women still had the 3 000m as an Olympic event,” he said. “If that was still the case, Caster would easily have stepped up to the 3 000m. Having to step up all the way to the 5 000m is much harder because the two events are completely different.

“The 5 000m is so much longer and is endurance-based. Caster isn’t a lean Ethiopian-type runner – she’s more a strength runner, which you can see in her size and musculature. You pay for having to carry that much weight over 5 000m.”

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