Since the distance is not on the program for the championships organized under the aegis of World Athletics, the international athletics federation, Letsile Tebogo will not officially have the honor of seeing her name associated with a world record. The Botswanan, however, achieved the best performance of all time in the 300 meters on Saturday February 17 during a meeting in Pretoria.
With a time of 30 seconds 71, the 20-year-old runner erased the benchmark set in 2017 by South African Wayde Van Niekerk in Ostrava, Czech Republic (30 seconds 81).
In 2000, it was on the same track in Pretoria that the American Michael Johnson, considered one of the greatest sprinters of all time, set the previous record with 30 sec 85. Another legend ran the distance in less than 31 seconds: the Jamaican Usain Bolt (30 sec 97, in 2010, in Ostrava).
In the summer of 2023, during the world championships in Budapest, Letsile Tebogo made the history of his sport by offering the African continent the first world medal in its history in the queen of athletics, the 100m. He finished second in 9 sec 88, only five hundredths behind Noah Lyles. Five days later, he took bronze in the 200 meters – won, again by the American.