SportsKenya: Daegu is Done....Bring On Maputo !!!

Monday 5 September 2011

Daegu is Done....Bring On Maputo !!!

The last 10 days or so have seen Kenya placed firmly among top nations and its has been a class act from our athletes. After giving a modest review which we guess among other things lifted their performance, we applaud their efforts and take a bow for it. The 13th Edition of the World Athletics Championships are truly memorable.

The performance speaks for itself, 7 Gold ( & 2 team titles for Marathon), 5 Silver & 4 Bronze. {Our review had the total medal tally at 4 Gold 5 Silver and 8 Bronze; with 2 of the Gold correctly predicted for 800m & 3000m men's steeplechase}.
What's even more uplifting is the fact that women almost matched the men's performance with one Vivian Cheruiyot taking the 5000m & 10000m double. The marathoners both men and women made it a successful start and end to the championships. They took individual and team titles much to the delight of the South Korean fans who seemed to have a soft spot for us. The added incentives of bonuses from event sponsors, Toyota and TDK as well as the Government of Kenya's promise to handsomely reward our sports personalities seems to inspire them to greater heights.
While this has been the best outing in the World Athletics Championships since their inauguration in 1983, we have now set the bar for future athletes starting with the more immediate All Africa Games in Maputo where we shall have the juniors in athletics and other sporting disciplines represented. These should set the stage for what ought to be a memorable 2012 Olympic Games in London where as a former colony of the British we ought to give a good show of what or how far our sporting prowess has come. Shall we live up to the expectations? We shall be watching....

SportsKenya's Best Performer Overall (& Women's Performer):
Vivian Cheruiyot (Gold) - Women's 5000m & 10000m:- Winning two long distance gold medals in one championships is the stuff legends are made of. You're a true Africa running Queen. Maybe next time we have such an outing, Kenya should have a lady as the team captain...huh?

Best Men's Performer:
Abel Kirui (Gold) - Men's Marathon :- Another sterling performance and retaining back-to-back world titles in the race. All this and beating the 2nd placed Kenyan by a whole 3min.

Best Men's Young Performer:
Asbel Kiprop (Gold) - Men's 1500m:- After making amends from previous major championships including the last World Athletics c'ships in Berlin, it was about time, this future legend got his own and the country's gold.

Best Women Young Performer:
Milcah Chemos (Bronze) - Women's 3000m steeplechase - though the favourite for the gold, this young lady was beaten to 3rd place but her potent is there to see and it shall be interesting to see how she holds up by next year's Olympics.

Best Team Performance:
Women's Marathon : The ladies set the pace for all the other gold medallists by opening the Games on a high taking 1-2-3 and thus getting the team title for the marathon. They even had one of the best sporting fair play moves by waiting up on one of their own as she fell at a watering area. True heroes if you ask.

1 comment:

Unknown said...: Congratulaion Kenyans, You had always made us proud.; 11 September 2011 at 22:32

Profile of a Kenyan Sports Personality

This is a look at a Kenyan personality who may have influenced and continues to affect sports in Kenya and inspires all and sundry in sports. It is our hope that you shall reflect on this, take a moment to appreciate the sacrifices and efforts these heroes made. We do take a bow and wave our hats as we cheer true Kenyan patriots in sport!

This one takes a different twist. Having seen individuals grace this column, we have sought to recognize a team of individuals who did some exemplary work and set what has been an unbeatable national and indeed continental effort.

Kenya has never been a major power in shorter races 400m downwards. Back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, this was a different script especially with the more exciting relay races. It is in 1968 when Kenya’s dominance came into play and with it a retinue of athletes who would become legends of their era.

The 4x400m races are usually the climax in the athletics calendar of events and in Mexico ’68, Kenya’s team including Charles Asati, Naftali Bon, Munyoro Nyamau and Daniel Rudisha ( the latter being the father to David Rudisha - current World and African champion in 800m) had other ideas coming 2^nd to USA.

In 1972, the 4 x 400m team was tweaked a bit and the final race was run by Charles Asati, Munyoro Nyamau, Robert Ouko and Julius Sang blazing the track to come up with the only other Gold medal from the Munich Games. But for this unprecedented move and none that has been done before by any other African nation, we salute our compatriots making them the Kenyan sprint legends!

Know your Sport

Swimming

Recently at some social setting we were engaged in a club quiz and one of the questions was about swimming. This sought to know which stroke was not among the competitive ones till 1956. One of our team-mates (we were 6 said that it was back-stroke while I argued it was butterfly, and the majority thought the former ….guess we should have stuck with my answer though!)

All the same, this sport has become one of the most competitive sports in any major sporting extravaganza in the form of the All-Africa Games, Commonwealth or indeed the Olympic Games. Kenya has lately featured in this very involving and energy-sapping sport. Thanks to the exploits of the Dunford brothers who have shone the spotlight on the country away from traditional sports in athletics, football, boxing and rugby. But what do you understand from the sport? Here’s a brief of it from different sources;

According to Wikipedia, swimming is based on the human act of swimming, that is, locomotion in water by self propulsion, with the goal of completing a given distance in the shortest amount of time. Swimming is distinguished from other aquatic sports (such as diving, synchronized swimming, and water polo) that involve swimming but the goal is neither speed nor endurance.

Competitive swimming consists of four strokes: butterfly, breaststroke, freestyle (or front crawl), and backstroke. When all four strokes are done during a race, it is called medley swimming (otherwise known as the individual medley, or I.M.). It is governed by the Fédération Internationale de Natation Amateur (FINA).

The goal of competitive swimming is usually to have the fastest time to complete a given distance. Competitive swimming became popular in the nineteenth century. Swimming is an event at the Summer Olympic Games, where male and female athletes compete in 13 of the recognized events each. Olympic events are held in a 50 meter pool (long course).

There are 36 officially recognized individual swimming events – 18 male events and 18 female events; however the International Olympic Committee only recognizes 34 of them – 17 male and 17 female. Most swimming sport events are held in special competition swimming pools, which are either long course pools such as those used in the Olympic Games (50 m) or short course pools such as those used in the FINA World Swimming Championships (25 m) (25 yards or 25 m). Competition pools have starting blocks from which the competitor can dive in, and possibly also touch-sensitive pads to electronically record the swimming time of each competitor.

In most competitions, the competitors are required to wear swimwear/swimsuits to adequately cover their bodies for the dip. However some suits have created controversies which have seen FINA coming up with standards to adhere to ensure competitors do not have undue advantage over each other.

The sport can also be pursued for personal fitness and is considered by fitness enthusiasts as one of the few that does an all-round job body of keeping the body in shape. It also requires healthy diets and rehydration (yes even if your body’s dipped in water)! Famous names in the sport include Mark Spitz – 7-gold medals winner 1972 Olympics and Michael Phelps – 8 gold medals - Beijing 2008.
For more info, check www.fina.org

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Monday 5 September 2011

Daegu is Done....Bring On Maputo !!!

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