Athletics Papua New Guinea president Tony Green has hailed the code’s Olympic Games representative Leonie Beu for her performance over the weekend at the American Track League.
Beu competed at the meet in Tennessee, United States on Saturday as lead up for the Paris games, finishing third in the 200m with a time of 23.76s after clocking in 11.73s in the 100m heats earlier.
Green said it was a top performance from Beu as she continues, he preparation for Paris.
The meet was a huge boost for Beu’s preparations as the race featured a host of top U.S athletes, many of whom made the finals in their respective events at the U.S Olympic trials recently.
The participants at the meet included double Olympic gold medalist Dalilah Muhammed and another 400m hurdler Anna Cockrell, who finished second at the U.S trials in the race on 30 June where Sydney McLaughlan set a new world record.
“Leonie’s performances over the weekend were very good. She has maintained the excellent form that she showed in Suva a little over month ago,” Green said.
“Her coaches in Tennessee are very happy with her progress and said she will now stay home and focus on her 100m training for the Olympics.
“Leonie was offered the chance to run in Gainesville, Florida this coming Friday but considering the travel and disruption to training, it was considered better to stay put and train through to her departure for Paris on 23 July.”
Beu will compete in the 100m preliminary round in Paris on the morning of Aug 2 and has an excellent chance to progress to the round one heats later in the session. She is expected to fly to Paris on 23 July and meet up with the Team PNG squad there, ahead of the opening ceremony on 26 July.