Jordan task now easy after team kit arrives
Members of Kenya’s cross country team to next weekend’s world championships in Amman Ines Chenonge (left), Ann Karindi (centre) and Mercy Cherono enjoy a cup of tea at the St Mark’s Teacher Training College in Kigari, Embu, where they are preparing for the annual global competition. Photo/MOHAMMED AMIN
What you need to know:
- Athletes shift gears at Kigari camp as trip to world meet in Amman closer
The national cross country team to the IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Amman can now sit pretty and focus on the task ahead of them after their training and competition kit arrived on Thursday.
As Athletics Kenya handed over the gear to the contingent at their Embu training camp, news filtered through that defending 12-kilometre champion, Kenenisa Bekele, and last year’s women’s eight-kilometre winner, Tirunesh Dibaba, both from Ethiopia, would definitely be giving the March 28 competition a wide berth due to injuries.
But Eritrea’s Zersenay Tadese, who won in 2007 in Mombasa, and Ethiopian Gelete Burka, the short course women’s champion in Fukuoka (2006), will both be at the championship.
Others expected are Qatar’s world 3,000m steeplechase record holder, Saif Saaeed Shaheen, Asian 10,000 metres record holder, Ahmed Hassan Abdullah of Qatar, European champion, Kenya-born Hilda Kibet, former world junior champion Meselech Melkamu of Ethiopia and world 1,500m champion Maryam Yusuf Jamal (Bahrain).
Kenya’s head coach, Julius Kirwa, yesterday said he was relieved after the training kit arrived, albeit just days to the team’s departure to the Jordanian capital next Tuesday.
Consignment
Athletics Kenya treasurer Joseph Kinyua took delivery of the consignment from American sports goods manufacturers, Nike, who are contracted by the association to kit Kenyan teams to international competitions.
Kenya is seeking to win the overall team title in Amman for an unprecedented 26th time in the event’s 37-year history. Kirwa has urged his athletes to follow up on the good performance by the country at last year’s Beijing Olympic Games.
