Runners hoping to win Saturday’s world cross coutry championships will have to contend with the formidable Kenyans, running as a team
CROSS COUNTRY: Julian Drew
IF YOU are not Kenyan and you want to win the world cross country championships, you not only need to be the best middle distance runner in the world, you also have to be a gambler and hope you choose to play the right hand.
The Kenyan men’s team have perfected the art of unselfish teamwork to ensure they win both the individual and team titles. So talented are these fleet-footed runners from the highlands of East Africa that they can designate their winner beforehand and then send the other team members out to protect him and act as decoys.
Unless you know who they have chosen you can wear yourself out chasing the leading Kenyan while the favourite hangs back, sheltered by his colleagues. But, let any one of the Kenyans get too far ahead while you cover those you think are the danger men, and the race will be over before it’s really started. It is these tactics that have thus far prevented even the world’s greatest ever middle distance runner, world 5000m and 10 000m record-holder Haile Gebrselassie of Ethiopia from winning this coveted title. In Saturday’s 24th IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Stellenbosch, Gebrselassie may well have the help of some of his own rapidly improving teammates in this daunting task, but he will still not start as an overwhelming favourite.
Fita Bayessa and the more recent additions to Ethiopia’s armoury, Worku Bakila and Ayele and Aseffa Mezgebu, can make Gebrselassie’s quest a little easier if they can help him in the battle up front and, as a team, they will certainly be a force.
So, too, will Morocco, who will have in their line-up the one man who in the past 10 years has managed to wrest the individual title from Kenya’s vice-like grip. Khalid Skah won in 1990 and 1991. He will have Khalid Boulami, Ismail Sghyr and Salah Hissou, all of whom finished in the top four of either the 5 000m or 10 000m at last year’s world championships in Gothenburg, to help his challenge.
Quite who the Kenyans have pre-ordained will only become clear as the race unfolds, but they have much talent to choose from. World 5 000m champion Ismael Kirui, African 5 000m/10 000m champion Josephat Machuka, world class challenge points leader James Kariuki and several other well-known names are in their team.
However, defending champion Paul Tergat feels sufficiently confident in his current form, which includes three wins out of three in the world cross challenge series, to declare himself a certain winner. But, while the real tussle for individual and team honours will undoubtedly be between these three African countries, there are at least two other individuals who are aiming to make their presence felt. They are South Africa’s Shadrack Hoff and Portugal’s Paulo Guerra. (See stories below)
The women’s race, perhaps, holds more interest than the men’s for those outside Africa, in that there is at least a realistic chance of the title leaving this continent. Defending champion Derartu Tulu of Ethiopia can expect close scrutiny from the likes of Kenya’s Rose Cheruiyot, who leads the women’s section of the world cross challenge series, Portugal’s world 10 000m champion Fernanda Ribeiro, and Britain’s former junior champion Paula Radcliffe.
But the dominant forces in cross country over the past six years are no longer in the running. American Lynn Jennings, who won the title from 1990 to 1992, opted out of cross country this year. Portugal’s Albertina Dias, who won in 1993, is now focusing on the marathon and no longer has the speed she used to.
Winner in 1994 Helen Chepngeno didn’t make the Kenyan team, while the runner-up for the last three years, Catherina McKiernan of Ireland, doesn’t appear to be in form. South Africa’s challenge has also been blunted by the absence of Elana Meyer and a below-par Zola Pieterse who is still regaining fitness after giving birth in October. So, too, has that of Romania. Two of its top athletes, Elena Fidatov and Iulia Negura, have just fallen foul of anti-doping controls and will not be able to run on Saturday.
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