Invest in athletes like they’re rugby, cricket players: Wayde van Niekerk

Wayde van Niekerk, fresh from winning the fourth world championship medal of his career, says investment in local athletes is required to get them to gold medal standard.

Van Niekerk, who returned home on Tuesday morning after his heroics in the 4x400m relay where he produced the fastest leg to help South Africa to bronze, also confirmed he had most probably run his final 400m.

He was upbeat about the depth of talent in the local men’s 400m, saying the relay team could win medals in future “with or without me”.

But Van Niekerk voiced his unhappiness that South African athletes were expected to win medals without getting the assistance they needed. 

“I’ve really been exposed to the fact that you can’t expect gold medals from guys you’re not treating like gold medallists,” said Van Niekerk, who secured South Africa’s last world championship gold medals at London 2017 along with women’s 800m star Caster Semenya and long-jumper Luvo Manyonga.

“If we’re going to look at our actual champions of the world — rugby and cricket — they put proper investment in these [teams]. They [the players] don’t need to think, ‘what is my plan B?’,” said the 33-year-old, who won 400m world titles at both Beijing 2015 and in London, where he also took the 200m silver.

Too many athletes faced stresses off the track, like studying and sometimes even working.

“We can’t be having athletes thinking of what needs to be done now after track and field — the guys that we’re competing against, their only focus is to bring their country a gold medal. So if we’re going to expect gold medals from these guys, we’re going to have to treat them like guys that are at that level ...

“These guys are all individuals, so if we want, as a federation, more medals, then we need to invest in them way more,” added Van Niekerk, who set the 43.03 sec world record winning Olympic gold at Rio 2016.

He said they had to be supported in their journeys to the championships and not have medal expectations dumped on them when they got to the start line.

“Let South Africa get behind these guys so that they can start believing and feeling each and every day that they are gold medallists. We can’t just get excited because guys are in the finals. We need to get excited at grassroots levels already and make sure we invest in these guys off their potential and not just when they make it to a final.”

Van Niekerk said he raced alongside many of the younger local athletes during the European season.

“They’re at the same level as I am and they had to submit assignments the night before their race at a Golden League. They had to send homework back and sit for weeks and weeks and then all I had to do is focus on my races.

“We really need to invest more in these guys so that, yes, they can educate themselves, but at the same time don’t have that stress of a plan B so they can focus on gold medals.”

His comments come against a backdrop where sport minister Gayton McKenzie recently slashed funding to Athletics South Africa by 60%, with many other Olympic federations also being hit by cuts. The South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc), which received nothing from McKenzie’s department, supports competitors who have already shown their potential has medal prospects.

Van Niekerk, who went 43.27 sec in the relay where South Africa finished third in a desperately close finish behind Botswana and the US, said his main goal for this year had been the 4x400m team. But he declined to commit to doing the one lap race again in the future.

“This is most likely my last 400m. I want to step down a bit now and focus on the other events,” added Van Niekerk, who has always preferred the shorter sprints.

“At the moment I’m done — but let me just have a good rest and reset for the off-season and position myself to do well next year and see what happens ...

“We’ve got a massive, massive group of guys coming through now, so I really think we’ll be among the podiums for the next few years — with or without me.”