08 Feb 2024

Athletics diehards should expect nothing but the best of all time treat as athletes outdistance each other during the Botswana Athletics Association (BAA) track and field series three at the National Stadium on Saturday.

When the starter pistol goes off, athletes will have nothing but one goal, to qualify for the African Games, World Athletics Relays, 2024 Olympic Games, African Senior Championships and the World Athletics U20 Championships.

In an interview, BAA vice president, Oabona Theetso said all the athletes knew the importance of the Saturday’s meet.

“I am cognisant of the fact that it is early in the season but it does not rule out that some athletes can hit a qualifying mark,” Theetso said.

He said athletes would be competing in the usual track and field’s events, adding they had accommodated other events to give all of them the opportunity to qualify for major events.

Again, he said they would introduce the relays in the Saturday series given that they were also preparing for the African Games and therefore would want to gauge athletes’ readiness.

Theetso said he was anticipating tough competition owing to the quality of the athletes who would be participating.

“Watch out for Zibani Ngozi, he is yet to qualify for the Olympic and obviously he wants to clock a better time to make it to the 4x 400 men’s relay. We are also expecting Boitumelo Masilo as well as Ditiro Nzamani who recently returned from an injury,” he said.

He said they were yet to receive requests from athletes from neighbouring countries, adding however at this time of the year, they normally received small number of requests given that athletes preferred to qualify on home soil.

Meanwhile, so far only five athletes have qualified for the Olympics, with Letsile Tebogo having qualified for 100m, 200m and 400m.

Other athletes who have qualified in the 400m include Leungo Scotch, Bayapo Ndori, Collen Kebinatshipi and 800m runner, Tshepiso Masalela. BOPA