Boston Marathon & Rotterdam Marathon - Some Other Great Outings for Kenyan Marathoners

Hoping to continue what was great year in 2011, Kenyan marathoners go at it again this weekend. Starting with the Rotterdam Marathon in the Dutch city, the Kenyans will be looking to attain better times for what will surely be a tough year for those hoping to make it to the Olympic squad. The selection of this team is already giving Athletics Kenya officials headaches.

Kenyan runners in Rotterdam - www.iaaf.org

Moses Mosop will lead Kenya's onslaught and hope to earn bragging rights in the race which is slowly becoming a launching pad for Kenyan marathoners hoping to make an impact in the bigger and 'richer' (in terms of prize money) races.  Others include Sammy Kitwara, Stephen Kibet among others. The race takes place on Sunday 15th of April.
A day later on 16th April , marathoners streak through the streets of Boston in the Boston Marathon - one of the most pretigious marathon races in the world. This race has become a tradition for Kenyan runners and many names have been made in this US city. From the likes of Cosmas Ndeti, Moses Tanui, Ibrahim Hussein to most recent winners in Geoffrey Mutai & Robert 'Mwafrika' K. Cheruiyot, it attracts the creme de la creme of marathons across the world.
Geoffrey Mutai is leading Kenya's challenge as Robert K. Cheruiyot dropped out due to some injury concerns.  In the women's race, Caroline Kilel will be hoping to retain her title in Boston as they launched one of Kenya's best year's in marathon racing history to become world beaters in the World Athletics championships.

Wondering if any of these Kenyans will attempt the world record set last year by Patrick Makau to break mold into the Olympic Games team proper. In a week's time, the next marathon station moves to the UK in the prestigious London Marathon.

Run with Kenyans

Friday found one of our contributors dutifully make it for a breakfast briefing by Brand Kenya. The morning's call was to launch activities geared towards marking the country's 50th (golden) anniversary ( yup Kenya's 50 on 2013!).

As has lately been realised by Government operatives and bodies tasked with promoting Kenya as nation brand, the use of sports is gaining credence and a focal point. As the Brand Kenya officials noted, it is important to leverage the country especially as it looks to mark some important milestones with an election next year as it moves to the next 50 years.

Sport has been known to unify the most warring of states and Kenya is no exception. As such some Kenyan entrepreneur who works in the US, one Wilson Kiriungi ,Marco Peterson(former IT entrepreneur) and Benjamin Rapoport (a medical practitioner) have come up with a organisation, Run With Kenyans. The motivation behind this organisation is to ride on the wave of Kenyan marathoners/athletes who have been winners of various top marathons across the world.

Using the goodwill built by the athletes, the organisation will target US recreational marathoners (the US has approximately 48 million of these, 15 million who run at least 10 times annually in the half & full marathons across the States). These runners are from the upper middle class to the affluent thus making good targets fpr sports tourism. 

Starting with the Boston Marathon, reputedly the oldest marathon in the world and which coincidentally has been won by Kenyans since 1991 (including a current sitting MP for Emgwen - Elijah Langat in 2000) ; the plans are to have a Kenyan House stand at the preceding Expo of the Marathon. This expo usually has an average attendance of 80,000. Replicating this across major marathons including the Chicago, New York, London among others. 

The other benefit is to pitch to the Kenyans living in the diaspora to cheer on their compatriots and also participate in the marathon(s). 

Robert 'Mwafrika' Cheruiyot - one of the past winners - Boston Marathon

We do wish them well in their endeavours and kudos to Brand Kenya for taking this initiative. This should not be the last of such ideas and the potent of sport is huge. If they can keep luring Government operatives away from the politics to focus more on such developments, the country will be all the better for this.