Kutlwano Magazine

This month in History (1968)

Source : Kutlwano

Author : Kutlwano

Location : GABORONE

Event : History

AT THE MBABANE OVAL running track on June 15, 1968, Botswana`s school-boy athletes broke five records in the first triangular athletics meeting involving Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland and in doing so won the boys section of the competition with 50 ½ points from Lesotho, who had 46 ½ points and Swaziland with 41 points.

Pride of place went to Charles Mosimanegape of Moeding with his two records in the mile and 880 yards. His mile record is all the more remarkable through an incident at the beginning of the second lap when the Lesotho runner immediately in front of him slipped on the grass track; Charles, who was right behind him, tripped and fell heavily; no other runner was involved in this crash and both runners who had fallen were left thirty yards behind; however Charles ran after the main bunch and slowly made up ground until in the last lap he broke from the bunch and won in the record time of 4 minutes 23.3 seconds.

One wonders what the time would have been if his run had not been broken by falling over the Lesotho runner – could it have been 4 minutes 10 seconds or even less? His win in the 880 yards was a classic piece of running, and he broke the record by almost a full 11 seconds, winning in 1 minute 58.5 seconds. Duke Pule of Gaborone ran well in this race to finish second in what must have been a personal best of around 2 minutes.

Duke Pule ran magnificently in the 440 yards to win in the record time of 51.2 seconds, beating his old record by 2 secs. Both of these runners ran well in the mile medly relay, Mosimanegape took over a five deficit and won by about thirty yards. The time of the Botswana team here was 3 minutes 38.15 seconds – 9.4 seconds better than the record they previously held.

Paul Rantao of Kanye won the high jump with a final jump of 5` 11”; this was 2” below his best but the conditions for jumping at Mbabane were not the best. Rantao was jumping in bare feet from a grassy take-off, with spectators crowding round the jumping pit to make concentration difficult.

Other winners for the Botswana boys were M. P. Lethedi of the T.T.C. Serowe, with a throw of 32` 5 ¾ in the shot putt; M. Kilibe of Botswana was third in this event; P. Rathedi of Moeng was first in the Hop, Step and Jump with a Jump 41` 2”. Places were won in the Long Jump by Keikantseng who was third, and 440 yards where Butale was third; Butale was also placed third equal in the 220 yards with Semethe of Lesotho; J. Mmereki was second in the javelin event.

Swaziland won the Girls competition with Botswana second and Lesotho third. Botswana girls who were placed in events were M. Ramosweu who was third in the High Jump and second in the long jump, D. Moncho who was third in the Shot Putt, R. Selema who was third in the 150 yards, M. Mafela who was third in the Discus, and the 4X110 yards relay team came second to Swaziland. ENDS