Hi everyone,
Sorry I haven't posted earlier but I am back.
Quick background. We have had a difficult year, Emile's mom was involved in a horrific car accident in November 2017. We nearly lost her. In December Emile suffered an Achilles injury and had to withdraw from the indoor Worlds. Consequently he did not participate in the South African season. He was cleared fit to compete in the Common Wealth games only 2 days before departure.
Answer to your question he is nearly 6'4" and 231 pounds, and yes he can catch a football. He played 7's rugby at school and was included in the junior "Blitzbokke" team in 2009 and 2010.
About his season in Europe. He started off in Germany and ran 10.21(heat) and won with a 10.20 after 27 hours in transit. Rested for 10 days, won in Copenhagen 10.11, 2 days later won in Sollentuna 10.15 and 3 days later ran 10.01(heat) ran the final 2 hours later in 10.02 and shaved .39 of his 200pb to 20.48 three hours after that.
Initially he wasn't included in the world cup squad because he never posted times but after his 10.11 he was included in the 4x100 but Athletics South Africa could not secure his visa in time. He was invited to run Bottrop on the same day as the world cup relays and accepted the invite as he could not travel to the UK. It was not a good race for him as you can imagine he was a bit tired. His flight back home to South Africa is booked for the 19th and so he decided to run in Cork where he won in 10.14 beating a Lynford Christie record from 1988.
I am including a quote from his coach after his 10.01 and about breaking 10sec
"Frans van Rooyen who coaches Erasmus admits that his athlete is in for a
tough challenge to find the extra speed to improve by a mere few
hundredths of a second however he believes the secret to doing so lies in
the execution of the race.
“Any good athlete should know what he had done from the start to the finish
of his race. If he does not, it was a waste of time. One of the reasons why
Emile is continuously getting faster is because he can remember exactly how
he executed each of his races. Afterwards, he knows what he did right and
where he erred, and that makes a big difference. Emile does not have to
‘reinvent the wheel’ when he races it is a case of adjusting small things in his
technique.
“Something that excites me about Emile is his fighting spirit. In Sunday’s final
the moment he got challenged by China’s Xie Zhenye he managed to dig
deep for one final surge of speed to ensure that he wins.”
Emile will arrive back in SA on Friday and leaving for Nigeria in the next week for the African Champs where we hope he will get a 100m shot.
That will end his season for 2018.
His rankings at this stage is 17 in the world, 3 in Africa and 2 in SA.
Thank you again for all the support from you guys and I will convey this to him.
He is one of the most popular athletes in SA and is known by his fellow athletes as the "Gentle Giant", "The Beast" and "the White Whale".
Regards for the moment.
Johan