19-year-old Nedbank running club Ethiopia’s Tadu Teshome Nare has been selected to join the Ethiopian national Olympic games preparation squad after participating in the Olympic trials this past weekend in Addis Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia.
The youngster, who dominated the road running scene in South Africa in 2018 and 2019 is certainly improving as her athletic career furthers. With countless podium finishes in the Spar ladies 10km series and claiming the overall junior title, Nare also took overall victory in the South African Half Marathon championships in 2019.
With South Africa being the first country Nare competed in outside of her home of Ethiopia, 2020 was to be the year that she looked towards Europe, and the year started off well. A big personal best and world class time of 1:09:57 saw the young Nare finish 12th in the Ras Al Khaimah Half Marathon, also known as the World’s most competitive half marathon.
This time put Nare on the radar of race organizers, however Covid19 and the coronavirus as we now know it, took over the World and the opportunity of racing in Europe fell to the side as races all around the World either got cancelled or postponed.
“That was quite a tough time for Tadu but we told ourselves that everyone is in this same situation so we must just remain positive,” says Belay Hagos, Nedbank Running Club Ethiopia Chairman and Coach. “In Addis we just continued to train to keep the body conditioned and not gain any weight.”
During this time, Nare worked on conditioning and also improving her speed. Over the past weekend, Ethiopia hosted an Olympic trials event where Nare finished 4th in the 1500m. “Now Tadu has been selected to join the Ethiopian national Olympic squad for training and will be in camp with them.” Her dream of competing in Europe is also one step closer now.
“She will be going to Henglo in around June and Ethiopia will host their final trials race for the Olympic team. There she will run in the 10 000m. The aim will be to of course make the team, but we will also be very happy with a big personal best as the race will be very quick.”
The Nedbank running club is proud to have played a part in the development of a talented athlete like Nare and continue to support her in her quest to become one of the Worlds greatest.