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Ellina Mhlanga Sports Reporter
THE National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe will hold their first track and field event this morning at the National Sports Stadium.

The meet is being hosted by the Harare Athletics Board and will feature both seniors and juniors with the juniors using the competition to prepare for the African Championships set for March in Ethiopia.

The juniors were supposed to have their first competition next week but HAB secretary-general, Sailus Muringani, said they had to stage the event today so that the athletes could have as many competitions as they can before the continental event.

“This is a national event being hosted by the Harare Athletics Board and we will have athletes from across the country.

“It’s actually a preparatory event for the African Championships in March. It has been slotted in as a revision on the calendar. We felt that our juniors needed a lot of competition before they compete in the African Championships,” said Muringani.

The competition will be at the B arena and Muringani, who is also the national head coach juniors, said they would have wanted to use the main ground but they could not because of lack of funds as they were hoping to have more athletes qualifying for the championships in Ethiopia.

“We are using the B arena because of expenses, we would have wanted to use the main ground. Obviously, it affects the standard because it’s a six-lane track and we would have so many heats and the times won’t really reflect the performance of the athletes. The next competition will be in Bulawayo at White City from 7 to 8 February. We want to capitalise on the electronic time at White City because the deadline for qualification is 8 and by midnight we should have sent the names.

“It would actually be good to have about 20 athletes but right now we have seven athletes who have qualified and some of the times are very good,” said Muringani.

The HAB will also hold their provincial cross-country on Sunday at Morris Depot with the senior men competing in the 12km race while the women participate in the 8km event. The junior boys and girls will take part in the 8km and 6km race respectively. They are also going to have the boys and girls cadets 4km and 3km races for boys and girls below the age of 16.

The competition was scheduled for early January but they could not stage the event as the venues were not ready.