Athletes might not be race fit by August, Letting warns

Veteran athletics coach David Letting fears athletes might not be race fit when the international athletics calendar commences in August.

The national team coach says the current situation in the country occasioned by the coronavirus pandemic has disrupted the training program, with the little individual training not good enough for elite athletes.

“Yes, we really do have a lot of challenges and what we are doing is individual training of which as the coach I am following closely to make sure they follow the program according to the calendar,” he ascertained.

He is however optimistic that the little achieved will play a big role in making sure that the status quo is quickly achieved.

“I expect them to be ready for the August challenge, but I don’t expect a good performance in the first few competitions because currently we have not had team training for a while and team work in athletics is very important,” he added.

Letting who led the National Cross Country team to last year’s World Cross Country Championships in Aarhus, Denmark wants institutions with training facilities to partially open for a small group of athletes in order to help in team training.

“We are only training on the road which is ideal for long runs but interval training can only be done in a good track which is not available, what currently we are working on is 300m run on the road,” he explained. “That is why we are talking to institutions so that they can give us training facilities of which we can bring a small number of athletes for some period because we really need fitness before August.”

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COVID-19 training athletes David Letting Race fit

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