Amantle Montsho, Baboloki Thebe and Oarabile Babolai are expected to be among local athletes expected to set the Lobatse Sports Complex tracks ablaze this coming weekend.
The trio will be making some long awaited comebacks to the track field following their forced break from athletics.
Montsho will be returning from a two year suspension over a failed doping test while Thebe and Babolai have been out with injuries.
Speaking in an interview with The Telegraph Sports, Botswana Athletics Association (BAA) Secretary General (SG) Legojane Kebaitse said the return of the trio is expected to be a major boost for local athletes.
“These athletes have been out for a while now and this is their chance to show their mettle. All of them have something to prove and their comeback to the tracks will surely raise the standard of competition,” the BAA Secretary General explained.
Kebaitse was in particular excited at the possible return of Montsho, who she said has been a big miss for the country’s athletics.
“If you look at the past year, we had the likes of Lydia Jele and Christine Botlogetswe who qualified for the Olympics. If you add Montsho into the mix, you will surely expect to see the standard of these two as well as other women athletes raise to a new level,” the BAA Secretary General opined.
“We are also preparing our teams for the IAAF World Relays in Bahamas on the 22nd of April and we are very hopeful that the arrival of Montsho will boost our women’s relay team. Her presence alone will be an inspiration to the women and girl athletes,” he said.
Another athlete who has been a sore miss, albeit for a few months due to injury is Thebe. The 20 year old star is said to have finished his rehabilitation and is thought to be ready to make a full comeback to athletics.
After injury stopped him from competing at the 2016 Rio Olympics, where he was expected to be a cog in the Botswana men’s 400mX400m relay, expectation is that Thebe will finally put laid his injuries and play a big role when Botswana compete at the IAAF World Relays.
Meanwhile, Kebaitse has explained that circumstances at the University of Botswana (UB) had forced the BAA to change next weekend’s athletics meet venue from UB Stadium to Lobatse Sports Complex.
“After the student strike at UB, we were informed that any access to the premises, including the UB Stadium will be difficult. The BAA then took a decision to find an alternative venue and that is how we ended up with the Lobatse Sports Complex,” he said.
