Things have now turned around as evident by the successful hosting of the 18th edition of BSSA National championships over four days at the University of Botswana (UB) pool.
The BSSA president, Kgaotsang Matthews, told SportMonitor that she was impressed by the turn up at the championships be it spectators, sponsors and swimmers.
The national championships attracted 308 swimmers with others coming from Zimbabwe. The championships were a Paris 2024 Olympic Games qualifier, unfortunately no swimmer punched a ticket to one of the biggest sporting events. The first day (Thursday) of the championships was kicked off with a long race of 1,500km, which challenges the physical strength of the swimmers but personal best (PBs) were clocked.
“The second day of the competition was held over very hot conditions and it was also the opening ceremony for the event. There were a lot of things going on, but we did well and managed to finish on time. A lot of swimmers have registered lots of PBs and that is what we wanted. Unfortunately, we did not get any upsets as our normal best swimmers continued to stand out. The swimmers from Zimbabwe were very good and they shared gold medals with our swimmers,” she said. Matthews also said having 308 swimmers attending the gala is a big achievement by the association more especially that it goes along with their strategy. She said they had almost same number before the sport was suspended due to the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic and she hopes the number would increase in the next edition.
She said BSSA has 10 clubs with only two coming from the northern part of the country, which is a huge decline.
“Nobody has qualified for the Olympics from our event, they are far from qualifying. Our best swimmers, Maxine Egner and Adrian Robinson that are trying to qualify just came from Doha at the World Aquatics Championships and they could not compete here because they are also going for the African Games. Egner and Robinson could have qualified, they have times that are closer to qualifying,” Matthews said. Meanwhile, Bekker was doing 50m, 100m, 200m, 400m and 800m freestyle. He also swam 100m and 200m backstroke including 200m individual medley and five relays. Speaking to SportMonitor, Bekker said the competition has been a struggle due to the many events that he had to compete in.
“Honestly, I was very fatigued from all the travelling, but I was doing my best to enjoy being home. As far as the BSSA National Championships are concerned, the competition was good. I was not too focused on getting specific times because the training schedule I am on in the USA is very different from here. I was focused on getting some experience and enjoyment from the competition,” he said. Bekker arrived in Gaborone on Wednesday night and flew back to the USA today (Monday) to write an examination. After a week, he jets off to Ghana for the African Games.
