Letsile Tebogo’s winning streak continues! Paris Olympics? Check. The 2024 Lausanne Diamond League? Check. And now on the Silesia track, the Botswanan welcomes his third consecutive 200m win. Though a victory is always memorable, if you ask Tebogo, this might not be his favorite one. Crossing the finish line in 19.83s, the clock signaled ‘all-clear’ for a golden finish and a new meet record. However, the reigning Olympic champion’s gut feeling says, ‘Something just didn’t sit right.’

19.46 in Paris and 19.64 at the Lausanne tracks, Tebogo’s timing today was a few hundredths of seconds slower. The statistics may say that he hit the nail on the head, but Tebogo’s instincts indicate otherwise. After the race, he confessed, “My momentum was bad bad. That is something I have to work on.” Something seemed so off-the-mark from his lens that he felt, “At the finish, I did not even think I won the race.” 

But at the end of the day, who doesn’t appreciate the thrill of a victory? He said, “But it is a good victory. In the Diamond League finals I need to fire on all cylinders. But overall, the season has been amazing.” The athlete very well knows that he will have to step up his game. Even though his unsaid motive was to have fun in the remaining meetings of the season after the Olympics, his competitive spirit has taken over. And he isn’t ready to backtrack now.

However, today was a day when Letsile Tebogo struggled with a slow start. In the DL race, until the midpoint, the Botswanan athlete trailed behind. But he switched to his supersonic gear and outpaced both Alexander Ogando and Kenny Bednarek in the last leg. Interestingly, he suffered the same fate today as the Jamaican legend Usain Bolt, whom he aspires to surpass. Bolt usually took a little longer to pick up the pace in his races, and so did Tebogo today, which marks an unusual commonality.

A study once revealed that Bolt’s reaction time to the start gun was seemingly slow. 0.165 was the second slowest in the Beijing Olympics final heat. Nonetheless, it is true that Usain Bolt’s historic records stand unbeaten today. 9.58s and 19.19s, no athlete has outpaced the Jamaican’s timings as of 2024. However, Letsile Tebogo is among the ones who made his goal quite clear.

Have Letsile Tebogo’s ambitions changed?

After his recent Lausanne gold, Tebogo appeared quite confident. Contrary to his Silesia upset, he had boldly claimed, “I don’t think it will take long, looking at what I did today and what I did in the 200m final. I don’t think it will take long for me to break the 200m world record, it’s about 10 meters away from me.”  However, he also added that he sees it, but he doesn’t want to put that pressure on himself by trying to topple the WR.

But today, he seemed unimpressed with his own form. The athlete whose 200m personal best rests at 19.46 is the world lead this year. Speaking of 100m, his quickest time ever was 9.86, clocked at Stade de France earlier this month. However, there is a lot of ground remaining to cover. Can Letsile Tebogo do that, as he wishes to go all guns blazing in the Diamond League finals? Let us know below.