{"id":257685,"date":"2017-08-07T06:06:27","date_gmt":"2017-08-06T20:06:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=257685"},"modified":"2017-08-07T06:06:27","modified_gmt":"2017-08-06T20:06:27","slug":"sapong-sets-new-pbt-100m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/sapong-sets-new-pbt-100m\/","title":{"rendered":"Sapong sets new PBT in 100m"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_257686\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-257686\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IAAF-pix-1-300x200.jpg\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-257686\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Zarinae Sapong of the CNMI runs in Heat 6 of the 100-meter sprint on Saturday in the 16th International Association of Athletics Federations World Championships in London, United Kingdom. (Contributed Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Zarinae Sapong accomplished her goal in setting a new personal best time in the 100-meter sprint on Saturday in the 16th International Association of Athletics Federations World Championships in London, United Kingdom.<\/p>\n<p>The 19-year-old, running in Heat 6 at the London Olympic Stadium at Marshgate Lane, clocked 13.29 seconds to shave off 0.06 milliseconds off the 13.35 time in her gold-medal winning performance in the 2016 Micronesian Athletics Championships in Pohnpei.<\/p>\n<p>She finished eighth and despite failing to qualify, Northern Marianas Athletics development officer Elias Rangamar still welcomed Sapong\u2019s new PBT. Only the first three sprinters and the next six fastest in each heat advanced to the semifinals.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was our own goal, for Zari to set a new PBT. We know that we\u2019re still years behind the world\u2019s best, since athletics is still in its infancy in the CNMI. We\u2019re really happy for this achievement,\u201d Rangamar told Saipan Tribune in a phone interview yesterday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did some tweaks with her technique a few days before she left and that thing worked. This is a huge confidence booster to her since we\u2019re using the Worlds to prepare for next year\u2019s MAC on Saipan and the Micro Games in Yap State.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rangamar added that Sapong\u2019s performance in London makes her the favorite in defending her MAC 100m gold and to win the same event in the Micro Games. \u201cWe\u2019re still going to work hard for her to further improve with her time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur ultimate goal is to break the 13- and 12-second marks in the Micro Games and MAC. There\u2019s room for her to improve. I love her work ethic, her commitment to train and improve her time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sapong is also the reigning 200m run champion in the MAC with a games record of 27.87 seconds while anchoring the CNMI women\u2019s 4x100m and 4x400m relay teams to bronze medals in the 2016 edition at Pohnpei State, Federated States of Micronesia.<\/p>\n<p>She also posted a 13.64-second time in the 100m sprint in this year\u2019s Oceania Area Championship in Fiji and 28.47 in the 200m run, improve her previous times of 13.91 and 28.97 seconds in the 2015 Oceania Championships in Cairns, Australia.<\/p>\n<p>European juniors champion Gina L\u00fcckenkemper of Germany surprised everyone by being the top qualifier with her own PBT of 10.95 seconds, joining favorites Dafne Schippers of the Netherlands (11.08), the United States\u2019 Tori Bowie (11.05), and 2016 Rio Olympics gold medalist Elaine Thompson of Jamaica (11.05).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Zarinae Sapong accomplished her goal in setting a new personal best time in the 100-meter&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":257686,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[26,17838,4366,1575],"class_list":["post-257685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-cnmi","tag-london-olympic-stadium","tag-mac","tag-pbt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/257685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=257685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/257685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/257686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=257685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=257685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=257685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}