Marathon squad in Games bid
SIX Hong Kong runners will make a final bid to qualify for October's Asian Games in Hiroshima when they compete in Sunday's Melbourne Marathon.
The four men and two women left this week for Australia with high hopes of reaching the qualifying standards required for inclusion in the Games.
It is their last chance to qualify before the June 15 deadline with the men aiming to better the qualifying time of two hours and 25 minutes while the women must run the 42-kilometre course around the Victoria state capital in under 2:50:00.
''It's a good marathon for these people to be in,'' said Garry Brown, the Hong Kong Sports Institute's head track and field coach. ''They have gone down there early because it's a fair bit colder than Hong Kong and it will give them a chance to acclimatise. One thing good about Australia is that they have similar time lines to Hong Kong and it makes it very easy for the athletes to adjust to different surroundings.'' Lo Man-yi and Winnie Ng Li-chu will compete in the women's division, while Ng Fai-yeung, Lee Kar-lun, Fung Wang-tak and Ho Wing-fai are the men's hopes.
Lo, 26, is coming off an injury-plagued year that has seen her battle back from calf and hamstring injuries. She has a career-best marathon time of about 2:47:00.
''She's had a hard year and the injuries have really hampered her development. But this is a marathon of reasonable quality and it's always been a good event to take people to,'' added Brown.
Ng, the 41 year-old known as ''Evergreen'' because she keeps going and going, has been experiencing a new lease of life recently after clocking a time of 2:51:00 at the Nagoya, Japan marathon. The veteran runner, who Brown says ''will run forever'' has only just resumed serious training. In her prime, when she competed for Hong Kong at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, Ng was recording times in the 2:40:00 range.
Lee, the Hong Kong male Athlete of the Year in 1993, is currently the territory's hottest marathon runner and looks to have the best chance of qualifying for the Games, with a recent marathon time of around 2:24:00.
Brown hopes that at least two runners will qualify for the Asian Games through this event, although he admits it would be hard for his athletes to win the race.
''They won't be of the calibre to win an international marathon. You have to be sub 2:10:00 to do that. In Asia, a performance of 2:20:00 is just fine,'' he said.
