Botswana will soon open doors to international athletes, thanks to the admission of the Gaborone International Meet (GIM) to the World Athletics calendar.
This also means that GIM will get funding from World Athletics, something, which would attract athletes from not only the region, but other continents.
GIM founder and chairperson, Glody Dube, said the admission was a major achievement given that the event would be published on the World Athletics website.
Furthermore, Dube said a GIM event, which shall be graded as a bronze meet, had been scheduled for April 24 next year.
Dube said organisers would have to up their game, by publishing provisional entry lists a week before the competition, tentative programme, mixed zone and upload results immediately after all events.
He said it was not easy for the meet to be admitted, given that there were some steps to be followed to satisfy the governing body.
“Some of the requirements were that, the GIM had to be registered as a company. Remember we applied ourselves and it was not the Botswana Athletics Association, which applied for the meet to be admitted, hence the World Athletics expected GIM to be a registered company,” he said.
The former 800-metre runner thanked government for supporting GIM, saying this bolstered their application for the admission.
The GIM started 13 years ago as the Sports View International Meet, but was rebranded in 2016. It has three categories of premium, classic and promotional.
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