Botswana sends two to Paralympics
Calistus Kolantsho | Saturday August 3, 2024 06:00
The games start on August 28 and run until September 8. The team will go for a pre-games camp before travelling to Paris, France. Edwin Masuge is competing in the men’s T30 400m and Gloria Majaga will be in the T13 100m and 400m. Masuge qualified after last year's World Championships in France while Majaga booked her place in Kobe, Japan during the World Para Championships, where she won a bronze medal in the women’s T13 100m. The team manager, Monty Ratlou, told MmegiSport that preparations for the Paralympics have been going well.
“We had three athletes who had hit the qualification standard for the Paralympic Games that was required by the World Paralympic Association, Masuge, Majaga, and T37 200m and 400m runner, Ronald Rich. Unfortunately, he was not part of the final team. We started working with this team in 2022, where Debswana Mine assisted in the preparations, especially with transportation and access to the National Stadium,” he said. Ratlou said in 2023, the mining giant assisted the team with training camp towards the World Para Championships that were held in France. He said by then they had 10 athletes who were earmarked towards the build-up of the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games. “We went to the Paris World Championships last year, and only one athlete hit the qualification mark being Masuge. From that time, we saw Rich reaching the mark in February during a competition held in Dubai. In March, he continued with his good performance.
Unfortunately, in the last qualifying event, which was the Kobe World Para Championships, our athletes did not do well. That is why we now only have two athletes,” he said. Ratlou said ever since qualifying, they have never taken a break as they have been on a training camp under the assistance of the Botswana National Sport Commission (BNSC), and they will be going for three weeks of pre-games training in Montrodat, France. Meanwhile, Ratlou said the Paralympic Games qualifications are different from the Olympics qualifications where there is a set standard. “In Paralympics, there are three ways to qualify. For the 2023 World Para Championships, the athletes had to be ranked in the top four.
There was also the 2024 World Para Championships, where athletes had to be ranked in the top two in order to qualify. There is also the high-performance standard whereby the World Paralympic Association set a standard that athletes had to meet,” he said. Ratlou said at the end of the competition, calculations are done to identify athletes who have met the qualification standard. He said the local athletes qualified through the high-performance standard.