Wednesday 16 May 2012

Julius Yego - Profile of a future Olympian

For most of us, YouTube is a form of entertainment as well as watching 'edu-tainment' clips or the latest music videos. For sports lovers, it serves as a nice platform for catching and replaying precious moments in their favourite sports events.
Julius Yego - trail-blazing Kenyan javelin thrower 
Enter Julius Yego - this Kenyan athlete (... no, not the typical track specialist) had other ideas for YouTube. Participating in an event which has never been a speciality for Kenya let alone Africa, he managed to hone his skill and better his technique using this social media platform.
And true to word, his skill got better and his techniques won him the first ever gold medal for a field event for Kenya in the 2011 All-Africa Games in the Mozambican capital of Maputo. This he did by breaking the national record to a then new record throw of 78.34m ( he has since broken it once to 79.95m and attained standard B throw length for the London Olympics).
Thanks to his exploits and his parent sports association in the name of Athletics Kenya, he managed to secure 2 months training stint in Finland which effects led to his attaining qualifying standards. Hoping to better his throwing before the start of the July-August event, Yego will surely join the many sports men and women who have made Olympic folklore not just by becoming champions but also by the mere part of participating in this 4-year sporting extravaganza.
And he stills recognises the role that social media plays in his everyday life of ensuring he becomes a world beater in the throw sport of javelin....thanks to YouTube!
He's truly a Kenyan and African sports legend in the making. Here's an article from Chinese's Xinhua on Julius Yego.

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