Pistorius Selected to South African Olympic Track Relay Team

Oscar Pistorius, the amputee track athlete known as the Blade Runner, was added to the South African squad for the London Olympics.

Pistorius will be part of the country’s 4x400 relay team with Willem de Beer, Ofentse Mogawane and Shaun de Jager, according to a statement from the South African Sports Confederation. The team won silver at the IAAF World Athletics Championships in Daegu, South Korea last year.

The 25-year-old runs with J-shaped carbon-fiber blades. Last month he failed to qualify for the 400 meters for the games, which start July 27.

He ran a time of 45.52 seconds at the African track championships in Benin. He needed to run a time of 45.30 for a second time in international competition to meet the criteria for the Olympics after reaching the standard in March.

Pistorius was born without fibulas and had both legs amputated below the knee when he was 11 months old. In 2008 the Court of Arbitration for Sport in 2008 overturned a ban on him by the International Association of Athletics Federations, track and field’s ruling body, which said the blades gave him an advantage.

Pistorius has qualified to defend his Paralympics titles in the 100, 200 and 400 meters.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Christopher Elser at celser@bloomberg.net