07 Jul 2025

The reigning 200 metre Olympic Champion, Letsile Tebogo got back to his winning ways as he triumphed the 200m event at the Eugene Diamond League, USA on Saturday, clocking a world leading time of 19.76 seconds.

Following a below par performance at the Rabat meet in May, where he laboured to a disappointing 9^th position in the 100m with a time of 10.43 seconds and retired from the 200m due to an injury, Tebogo made a memorable come back to the track over the weekend to register his second Diamond League meeting victory of the season. In a race that he was tipped to be a favourite in the absence of Kenny Bednarek, Tebogo had the lane choice and opted for lane seven.

The Olympic champion responded superbly to the start gun and was quick of the sprint blocks, eating some ground on Jereen Richards of Trinidad and Tobacco in lane eight within the first 10m of the race and only had the American, Courtney Lindsey and Dominican Republic’s, Alexander Ogando on his shoulder coming out of the bend. After a rather conservative bend run, Tebogo turned on the afterburners in the latter part of the race finishing with a flourish with Lindsey taking second place in 19.87s and Ogando rounding out the podium with 19.94s.

In his post-race interview, Tebogo expressed delight with his performance saying, “this is something that we did not expect, we were looking for some 19.90s or 20.00s and I strongly believe that the 19.76s is an indication that we are on the right track and need to build on it going forward.”

Despite setting a new world lead, it was Tebogo’s calmness at the finish line and victory celebration with an illustration of a crown and time signal that left many talking. Tebogo’s victory in Eugene could not have come at a better time with only two months to go before the World Athletics Championships in Japan. ENDS