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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Rachel Savage in Gaborone

Gaborone gold rush: how Botswana rose to the top of men’s sprinting

Letsile Tebogo takes the baton in a race on a blue athletics track
Botswana's Letsile Tebogo (centre) takes the baton from Lee Eppie in the men's 4x400m final at the World Athletics Relays in Gaborone this month. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

It was a fairytale ending to the World Athletics Relays in Gaborone. In the final strait, Collen Kebinatshipi surged past South Africa’s Zakithi Nene to win the men’s 4x400m relay for Botswana. The home crowd, a sea of light blue, went wild.

“It means so many things to us,” Letsile Tebogo, 22, the reigning 200m Olympic champion, who ran the second leg, told reporters afterwards. “Not just the team … but for the people that always cheer for us behind the TV. Now they had that experience to see first-hand how much effort, how much pressure, how much we give for them.”

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