Lwandile Simelane's experience as a hockey goalkeeper, fending off missiles launched with bone-jarring menace, should give her a sense of what to expect on the newly elected SA Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc) board.
Fixing the cash-strapped umbrella body is a monumental task. It's got no credibility, a shortage of skilled staff and no money.
It's so dire that Sascoc hasn't paid a cent in support this year to the top Olympic and Paralympic medal hopes for the Tokyo Games. It can't afford to repair its only lift.
The last ride
But Simelane, who thinks she took the last ride in the elevator when it got stuck months ago, is relishing the challenge. "You need to fire on all cylinders to bring back investor confidence," she told the Sunday Times in an interview this week.
"You have to fix your governance, you have to fix the image of the organisation, you have to centralise and put trust at the core, the athletes, and the money will come in if they trust the system."
Much has been made of the fact that she is the first black African woman voted into Sascoc's second-most powerful position - first vice-president - but more impressive is that she's the youngest.
Wealth of executive experience
At 34, she's even younger than SA hockey men's goalkeeper Rassie Pieterse, but already she has a wealth of executive experience, which includes serving on the SA Hockey Association as vice-president.
Simelane was arguably the most popular choice in Sascoc's elections for the top three posts last weekend. She beat her nearest rival by 32 votes, compared to president Barry Hendricks' margin of 23 and the nine for second vice-president Debbie Alexander.
She showed her mettle while serving on the previous board as a co-opted member, speaking up even when she was outnumbered. She eventually resigned.
"In sport sometimes we need to vote with our feet. If there's things you don't agree with then it's so difficult to come back after you've sat there and watched as a spectator and go 'but remember I didn't agree, hey'."
Among the pressing issues facing the new board is the investigation into Hendricks demanded by their predecessors.
"At our first big meeting those are the types of things we kind of have to strike off our list so that we can start on a clean slate ... it's not something we're going to ignore. It's in the public space."
Simelane spent much of her youth on her grandparents' chicken farm in Standerton, and matriculated at Bryanston.
She played hockey from a young age, making the Southern Gauteng schools team. "I was thrown into the goals when the team needed a keeper in primary school and clearly I was the only one crazy enough to put on the gear and put myself in the firing line," said Simelane, who quit the sport after suffering an injury in a football match for her residence at the University of Johannesburg.
There she became the first female SRC president before graduating with a BA Honours in international politics.
Simelane since completed a postgraduate diploma in labour law and recently she sat her final two board exams required to become a chartered company secretary.
In between studies and sport administration she holds down a fulltime job as the head of administration at an agricultural company raising chickens.
Simelane is heartened by a new level of collaboration between the sports federations that make up Sascoc. It's a great cause for optimism, but she remains realistic.
"I don't think we would have been elected if the membership didn't think we understood the gravity of the task at hand. We're going to be scrappers, we're going to fight until the end."
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