ASA gearing up for the national 10km championships in Mangaung

The event will form part of the North Ridge Mall Marathon in the Free State Province and top athletes such as Bennet Seloyi, Taylor Kavanagh, Glenrose Xaba, and Jerry Motsau are expected to battle for national glory.

Mathane told SABC Sport that the national federation plans to go all out for what will be their final competition of the year.

"On the 15th of November there is an ASA Championship incorporated with the Free State Athletics, everything is well prepared in advance. We will send our delegation to make sure that the event takes place,” Methane said. 

“We were informed that there are already 14 provinces that have been entered, I think 256 if not 254 athletes who will be competing in the Championship. Everything is fine, we are waiting for Saturday for the competition and the provinces will compete amongst themselves."

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Mathane, who also serves as the president of Athletics Gauteng North and works as a full-time government official, said Bloemfontein was selected as the host city as part of ASA’s rotational championship programme across the country.

"Remember we have 17 provinces in athletics and now when you host an event you send an invite for the province that needs to bid. When the province bids, we rotate amongst the competitions to say, we cannot host championships in one province, we need to rotate amongst 17 provinces so that each and everyone can get a fair chance of hosting an event," he added.

Mathane added that ASA is collaborating with major race organisers such as the Spar Women’s Series and the Absa Run Your City series to synchronise their calendars, allowing athletes to compete across multiple events without schedule clashes.

The event will be broadcast live on SABC 2 on Saturday from 6am.