30 Aug 2022

The Botswana Cycling Association (BCA) has promised to continue improving the national championships race route course by providing more challenging technical courses.

This followed suggestions from athletes that the race route terrain should be more competitive to match the international cycling events.

The BCA president, Kagiso Potongwane, said the association through the advice of the technical committee had made some notable changes to the championships race course and delivered impressive competition.

“We are happy with the riders who came out here to compete, and we tried to improve on the route course and create a more difficult and challenging track than previous ones. We are still going to improve and make our course more competitive and challenging, so that as we prepare athletes for development purposes, they are able to experience what they will find out there,” said Potongwane.

He further applauded athletes for attending in good numbers especially the youth, adding they were focusing on youth as part of development and that they would continue to work with affiliating clubs to sustain the numbers throughout the development plan.

“As BCA we facilitate and we need to engage with affiliate clubs and understand their plans and establish how we can assist them as an association, as they are the ones closer to the riders and parents,” he said.

Potongwane further expressed gratitude to the youth girls, noting that it was impressive to have girls in a cycling sport.

“We will work more around the girls’ participation and ensure they go through development,” he said adding that there was so much that needed to be done by his committee.

He said they would engage with clubs and set a three year strategic path and align it to BNOC and BNSC.

Regarding their Elite athletes who are abroad, Potongwane said they work closely with BNSC to facilitate the athletes and ensure that they were provided with what they need.

He however cited few challenging needs such as limited funding as it makes it difficult to even participate in national events or those in areas where they are based.

Potongwane said going forth they need to improve on managing every athlete on a program, and both BNSC and BCA are in sync with the athletes’ wellbeing and performance whilst abroad.

Meanwhile, the MTB cycling community also appreciated the new developments to the route course and applauded the association for the effort. “The route was very technical, it was a good route course and a good start in us as a country in matching international standards,” said Cyle4Life Cycling Club president, Themba Giddie.

He said the MTB discipline was heading in the right direction and advised that more challenging technical courses could be added in the coming MTB races.

Giddie further said although his club has no development plan currently, they would in future look into that, particularly the development of girls. Ends