The one vital benefit of a dismal efficiency at world championships is that there’s loads of area to enhance subsequent time, and this may doubtless be the case for the Kenyan workforce heading to the 2024 Glasgow indoor championships occurring from 1st to third March.
Final time, in Belgrade, Kenya, simply two medals had been harvested. There was one silver medal from Noah Kibet within the males’s 800m occasion and a bronze medal from Abel Kipsang within the 1500m. The Kenyan ladies gained none. Within the earlier championships 2018, Kenya gained only one bronze medal by means of Bethwel Birgen within the males’s 3000m.
Earlier than anybody might clarify that the variety of medals that Kenya acquired within the final World Indoor Championships may very well be as a result of there aren’t any indoor monitor occasions in Kenya, it’s value noting that their neighbor, Ethiopia, whose athletes prepare in beneath comparable circumstances, gained the general title in Belgrade with 4 gold medals and a complete of 9 medals.
All that Ethiopia wanted to win the general title on the final championships was to win the lads’s and girls’s 1500m and three,000m particular person gold medals.
Nevertheless, this time, the contingent of Kenyan runners attending the Glasgow indoor championships seems to be poised to reap extra medals.
For the primary time, Kenya has a sprinter among the many prime contenders within the males’s 60m. Ferdinand Omanyala, with 6.51, is at the moment within the prime ten quickest runners within the occasion this 12 months and is the fourth quickest entrant in Glasgow. He’s additionally ranked as World quantity 3 behind Noah Lyles and Christian Coleman. Kenya additionally has a formidable 4X400m males’s relay workforce that has entered the championships.
Within the distance occasions, if Noah Kibet improves by only one place from the final indoor championships, Kenya might win a gold medal within the males’s 800m race. Mariano Garcia, the defending champion; Bryce Hoppel, who was the bronze medalist final time; Catalin Tecuceanu, who has the quickest seasonal greatest time; and Tshepiso Masalela, who’re among the large contenders on this race. Collins Kipruto is the opposite Kenyan within the race.
Vincent Kibet Keter, who can be representing Kenya within the males’s 1500m race, has the fifth quickest seasonal greatest time of three:34.44, which makes him one of many medal hopefuls.
Whereas the Kenyan males didn’t discipline runners within the 3000m occasion, two ladies can be within the ladies’s occasion. World record-holder of the 3000m steeplechase, Beatrice Chepkech and Teresiah Muthoni, can be aiming to win a medal for Kenya right here. With not one of the indoor medals ever coming from the Kenyan ladies within the final two editions, this may lastly be alternative for them to interrupt the jinx.
African 4x400m relay silver medalists Naomi Korir and Vivian Kiprotich would be the different two Kenyan ladies who will take part within the 800m occasion.
On the finish of the championships, two silver medals can be Kenya’s greatest efficiency within the final three editions.
