Teboho Molapo
MASERU — Selloane Tšoaeli says she has already started preparing for the London Olympics next September.
In an interview with the Sunday Express on Monday Tšoaeli said the Olympic Games will be her biggest challenge.
Tšoaeli, who competes in the high jump and combined events, has been out of competition since the All Africa Games which ended last month.
“I’m still undergoing physical preparation at the moment,” Tšoaeli said.
“Everybody is looking at the Olympics next year. The African Championships are also due to come and it’s the event that I am looking at.”
She added: “I want to participate in both events (high jump and combined events) but it will be decided by competition (that I will face).
“Most of the times it’s the competition that decides which events I go for. Right now when you don’t have any competition you are unable to see where you are,” Tšoaeli said.
Last July Tšoaeli earned herself the ‘Golden Girl’ tag when she became the first Mosotho athlete to win gold at the African Senior Championships in Kenya which is the continent’s showpiece track and field event.
Tšoaeli also won bronze in the combined events competition at the Championships to cap one of the finest individual performances by a local athlete at an international competition.
As a result of that performance Tšoaeli became the first Mosotho to take part in the IAAF Continental Cup last September.
“2011 has been tough, very tough. At the start of the year to May I would say things were very fine. But the change of coaches and the different routine affected me. It meant I changed my training programme and it made me quite tired,” she said.
In June Tšoaeli and training partner sprinter Mosito Lehata left for training in Mauritius without their coach because the Lesotho Athletics Amateur Association (LAAA) had no money to pay his travel and accommodation expenses.
It meant she was with a different coach from June to August in preparation for the All Africa Games which were held in Mozambique
But Tšoaeli did well at the All Africa Games even though she didn’t win a medal in her specialist event, the high jump.
“I would like to say that I did well. The competition was very tough,” Tšoaeli said.
“In the high jump we were all the same standard. I didn’t do so well. But in the combined events I was able to set three national records and I ran a season’s best in the 800 metres.”
“The athletics calendar is only going to be coming out in the coming weeks and I will able to see which events I will take part in and my programme,” Tšoaeli said.
Tšoaeli added the 100 metres hurdles, the long jump and the shot put records at the All Africa Games to the national record she already held in the high jump and combined events.
Tšoaeli won bronze in the combined events at the All Africa Games last month to add to her medal haul over the past 12 months.
Tšoaeli along with Mokhotho Moroke and Lineo Mochesane were last Friday each rewarded with M2 500 by the government for claiming bronze medals at the All Africa Games which were held in Maputo, Mozambique.
The championships ran from August 27 to September 4.
Moroke won bronze in boxing while Mochesane won bronze in taekwondo.
The trio’s medals meant Lesotho finished in 30th position out of the 53 participating nations.