TSHEPANG Makhete, runner-up to 19-time SA hammer throw titleholder Chris Harmse at the weekend, picked up the technique in a matter of weeks.

Coach Basie Koen, who also works with Harmse, says Makhete arrived as a schoolboy, after being introduced to the sport by classmate Stefanie Greyling.

"She [Greyling] said he may be interested in the hammer throw," said Koen, who heads a hammer throw academy in Sasolburg, Mpumalanga.

"He took to it in fast time - a matter of weeks."

Koen, who also works at the Vaal University of Technology, explains that the hammer throw was a technical event that presented many challenges to participants.

"Hammer is something you've got to learn. It's not like running and walking that comes naturally."

Within a month, Makhete was throwing off three turns, then four.

"You're working with Newton's laws, so to speak. You're working with gravity, you're working against gravity, you're using momentum.

"Technically, we're not so sound in hammer throw in South Africa. It's big in northern Europe," says Koen, adding he had brought out the women's world record-holder, Betty Heidler, and her coach for a clinic.

Makhete ended sixth at the world youth championships in Ukraine last year with a 75.54m personal best. The winning distance was 79.38m.

He is not built like the typical hammer thrower. "He is not a big guy like Chris, Tshepang is more athletic," says Koen.

"He's about six feet (about 1.83m) and he's extremely strong and very quick. He could have been a good baseballer, or basketball player, or a good high-jumper, or a long-jumper."

Koen says the biggest requirement for Makhete, 18, was getting more exposure at international level.

"He said he could have thrown even further at the world youth championships, but said he hadn't had enough exposure," he says, adding: "The New Zealand team spent two weeks in Germany just preparing before the competition."