Nairobi’s bid to stage IAAF event cleared

The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) Council has cleared Nairobi’s candidature to host the 2017 IAAF World Youth Championships.

The IAAF Council meeting in Dakar cleared Athletics Kenya’s letter of intent to bid for the championship that, if successful, will be the biggest ever international sporting event organised in Nairobi.

Nairobi faces challenge from Buenos Aires (Argentina) and Greensboro (USA). The final voting will take place during Council’s meeting at the IAAF headquarters in Monaco in November.

The 2013 edition of the championships were held in Donetsk, Ukraine. Cali in Colombia is preparing to host next year’s event.

Kampala’s bid for the 2017 IAAF World Cross Country Championships was accepted with the Ugandan capital’s only opponent being Bahrain’s Manama.

Kenya hosted the global cross country championships in Mombasa in 2007.

In an eventful week of IAAF meetings in Dakar, AK president Isaiah Kiplagat, who is also an IAAF Council member, was decorated with the title of ‘Officer of the Order of the Golden Lion’ by the President of Senegal, Macky Sall, at the Presidential Palace in Dakar.

STRONG BID

IAAF president, Lamine Diack, a Senegalese national, was also conferred with the title of ‘Commander of the Order of the Golden Lion’ with IAAF Council members Roberto Gesta de Melo, Bob Hersh, Abby Hoffman, Jose Maria Odriozola, Jung-Ki Park, Irena Szewinska and Hansjorg Wirz also receiving the award of ‘Officer of the Order of the Golden Lion’ along with Kiplagat.

“It was something special,” Kiplagat said in Eldoret yesterday. “Getting the Presidential decoration and Nairobi being cleared to bid for the World Youth Championships in 2017 was great news for Kenya.”

“AK will constitute a bidding team to prepare the documentation for making a strong bid.”

“We’ll be required to fill relevant forms before a team of inspectors from the IAAF visit Nairobi.”

“We are required to send in the forms by September then the IAAF Council will unveil the successful candidate in November.”

Kiplagat said the Kenyan bid was “well received” by the Council that also received bids for the 2019 World Championships from Doha, Barcelona and Eugene. Ostrava and Bydgoszcz were cleared to bid for the 2018 IAAF Continental Cup.

Diack, a former mayor of Dakar, also confirmed he would step down next summer.

 while inviting the IAAF Council members to the Senegalese capital for the meetings.

“It is a source of great pride and satisfaction for me to be able to welcome my colleagues from the Council to Dakar for the last time, because the next few editions are set for Monaco and Beijing, and I will then step down as President in August 2015,” said Diack.

The IAAF approved an innovative timetable for the 2015 World Championships in Beijing.

The Council also approved entry standards for the 10,000m (27:45 for men and 32:00 for women), marathons (2:18 and 2:44), race walking (1:25 and 1:36 with 4:06 for 50km) and combined events (8,075 and 6,075) with qualifying period starting from January 1 this year.

Reports say the standards of all other events will be approved in November 2014 in the new system of entry standards.