Top SA hurdler Marione Fourie eyes world champs qualification

The 21-year-old from the University of Pretoria must achieve the qualifying time of 12.78 to book her ticket to the World Championships.

After winning the ASA Grand Prix 3/Continental Tour Challenger in Potchefstroom in a time of 13.01 last month, Fourie has told SABC Sport she has to work on a few technical issues regarding her race to achieve her goal.

"I'm running at the right side of the hurdle, so I have to get that right in order to drop to that lower 12:70, but it's just a few erros that I have to correct," said Fourie.

"It helps a lot [competing with Taylon Bieldt] because it pushes me to get faster times, so I wish she could run the event more. 

"The technical training we do, we put a lot of time and effort in, but over the hurdles I'm a lot faster, so we have to just improve the speed in between."

With the end of the South African track season approaching, Fourie will continue her quest in Europe to qualify for the World Championships next month and is confident of either running the time or qualifying through the world ranking points system.

"I'm going to run in Hangelo [Netherlands] on June 3 or 4, and then in July I'm going over to Europe, [but] I'm not worried, I'm higher on the rankings than last year, so I'm not worried. If I run at Hangelo, I think I can run the qualifying time," she stressed.