Africa-Press – Botswana. Botswana’s performance at the Paralympic Athletics Championships held in New Dehli, India from September 27 to October 5, was significantly hampered by lack of adequate preparation and key athlete injuries, the team’s coach has said.
In an interview, coach Nason ‘Hadji’ Maotwe said their not-so-good performance was because of inadequate training.
Maotwe said they had two groups of athletes which included those that trained in Gaborone and Mochudi and that created a gap in their preparation.
He added that Thuso Baleseng’s situation was also dicey because he stayed in Mochudi while his guide in the T11 category stayed in Morwa.
He said the athlete sometimes did not train when his guide was not available. However, he said things became better six weeks before the championships because they were then assisted to both train in Gaborone.
“But looking at his performance, had he prepared well he could have won a medal, and a gold for that matter, because with less than two months of proper training he managed to drop a good time,” he said.
Maotwe said another thing that cost Team Botswana was Edwin Masuge’s injury that he sustained during the warm-up, hence he started slow on the block. “But then again, the other challenge was that three weeks before we travelled to India, our office took a decision to change the whole technical team which was to travel with the team and then reversed it. That alone, affected the athletes’ performance, because two weeks before the competition everything was paused, but they were reinstated, which caused confusion,” he said
Meanwhile, the team comprised Ronald Rich (200m, 400m T37), Masuge (400m T13), Tumo Masejane (400m T13) and Lame Monamati (400m T12).
Bose Mokgwathi also represented the country in 400m T13 as well as Onkamile Bankaetse and his guide (400m T11) and Gloria Majaga in 400m T13 and 100m T13 while Katlego Matuto competed in 400m T12.
Mokgwathi was the only athlete who managed to salvage a bronze medal in the men’s 400m T13 with a Personal Best time of 49.66.
Another medal prospect in the men’s 400m T13, Masuge, did not make it to the podium as he finished sixth with 51.65.
Expectations were high that Gloria Majaga would increase the medal tally on Sunday, but she finished fourth in the women’s 400m T13 final, with a time of 1:01.30.
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