Kenya comes up short
Thoughts on the country's recent "failures" in major championships

by Scott Douglas

When Ethiopia won the senior men's 12K title at the 2004 World Cross Country Championships, it was the first time since 1986 that Kenya hadn't won the event. The loss was deemed such a failure that it made the cover of The Athlete, Kenya's only running magazine. By the time I visited Kenya last December, the "failures" had continued. Kenyan men won no medals in the 2004 Olympic 10,000m or marathon, as had occurred at the previous summer's World Track & Field Championships. During my stay, I gathered opinions on why Kenya no longer seemed capable of prevailing at the highest levels of competition.

If this topic were being summarized for Bill Clinton, the take-home message would be, "It's the federation, stupid." With no prodding, everyone I talked to named the Kenyan Amateur Athletic Association, which is part of the federal government, as the major culprit. For starters, the federation is literally out of touch — it's based in Nairobi, five hours by car from the Kaptagat/Eldoret/Iten nexus that's the epicenter of the Kenyan running phenomenon. "One fellow from the federation came to Iten to have a look around seven or eight years ago," says coach Colm O'Connell. "That's been it."

I got a taste of the federation's aloofness while sitting in O'Connell's living room one Saturday morning. Leafing through the sports pages of The Nation, O'Connell chuckled and then said, "Well, this is interesting — it appears I have been summoned to attend a meeting in Nairobi on Wednesday." He then showed me a two-paragraph item added to the end of an unrelated running article that announced a meeting of high-level coaches four days hence. O'Connell's being named in the article as one who would be at the meeting was his first notice of it. "What if you hadn't happened to see this?" I asked. "Oh, then it would be assumed that I have no opinion as to how they should proceed," he replied.

Pieter Langerhorst, who is married to Lornah Kiplagat, used to be an agent for several Kenyans but says he gave up that role in part because of the federation. "I used to pay them $1,000 a year to be an agent here," he told me, "and I never got anything from them, not even an Athletics Kenya calendar or a return call. The next time you'd hear from them is when it's time to pay the next year's fee."

Kiplagat's experience — switching citizenship out of frustration over Kenya's team-selection process — is also illustrative. Before world championships, there are trials, but the top finishers aren't guaranteed a spot on the team (and not because of the American scenario of not having run an "A" qualifying time). Federation officials regularly and arbitrarily alter team rosters on the grounds that Runner A, despite doing well at the trials, will not perform as well on the world stage as Runner B. Sometimes they guess correctly, and sometimes they don't. One of the most notorious cases of their being wrong was in 1996, when Runner A was Daniel Komen, who was left off of the Olympic team but later that summer set the world 3,000m record and just missed the 5,000m record while beating Haile Gebrselassie.

The unpredictable selection process is also draining Kenya's talent pool. Coach Renato Canova says that the desire to know if one will be allowed to compete in a championship meet is a major motive for the many former Kenyans he now coaches for Qatar, including the world record holder in the 3,000m steeplechase, Saif Saaeed Shaheen (born Stephen Cherono). Over tea one morning, I asked aspiring 5,000m runner Andrew Kiplimo if he would switch citizenship if courted by Qatar. "Why not?" he responded. "Here I might run 12:50 and take second position and they might say, 'You don't have enough experience.'"

No Nurturing
As one who works primarily with teens, O'Connell sees firsthand how the federation does nothing to develop young runners. Ironically, he says, "One problem is that there's so much talent. The federation is of the mindset that there will always be plenty more where that came from, so why should they bother to nurture talent? It gets left to everyone else but the federation."

Given Kenya's economy, it's understandable that young runners are focused on immediate gains, not long-term development. Without guidance, such runners can neither achieve their potential nor be counted on to produce peak performances in championship meets. After a race in Kaptagat one morning, I spoke with 800m world record holder Wilson Kipketer (who, it should be noted, switched citizenship partly to avoid the Kenyan team-selection process). He pointed to an SUV owned by one of the world-class runners there to watch the race and said, "Young athletes here, they think, 'I want to drive one like that' instead of, 'I want to make good results.' There is no bridge — they try to make the jump from here to there, but they too often fall in the water and struggle. It is a great distance between the top and the bottom. We need to build stairs that anyone can climb. The athletes now on top must not overlook those on the bottom — they must help them climb up. This is true not only in athletics, but in life in general. We should have a channel that everyone passes through. We should look back and have respect for how those who have reached the top made it there. But if someone comes and runs 1:39 [for 800 meters, compared to Kipketer's 1:41], then me, they will forget me. 'This guy, this 1:39 guy, he's the one to look to,' they will think."

Financial incentives, or the lack thereof, flowing from the federation are a main reason for recent Kenyan failures, according to Kiplimo and his training partners. "They like the athletes to represent our country without giving them some money," Kiplimo told me. "We need support to be able to train. Under the old government" — the Moi administration, which ruled from 1978 to 2002 — "athletes received money. Now, we are not supported. Moi said, 'Pay them well.' You were rewarded when you got a medal. That was motivation. Now, the new government, instead of that, you are taxed!" Among Kiplimo's training partners is Simon Kiptum, whose brother, James Kwalia, now runs for Qatar.

Complications at Camp
The survival-of-the-fittest pre-Worlds camp used to be cited as a main reason for Kenya's cross country dominance; now many on the inside think it's a reason for the lack of gold. "Individual athletes tend to fear that, very often, our national camps become too competitive, with the first six athletes at the trials trying to prove/maintain their shape, while the reserves are trying their utmost to work their way onto the team," O'Connell wrote to me in late February.

O'Connell was responding to an e-mail I had sent him after reading several news articles about many top Kenyans threatening to skip the national training camp before this year's World Cross Country Championships. Two of O'Connell's athletes, Augustine Choge and Isaac Songok, were among those named to the team who wanted to stay with their regular coaches until soon before the world meet.

Songok has firsthand knowledge of how the camps can run amok. Last summer, he won the Kenyan Olympic Trials at 1,500m (beating eventual Olympic silver medalist Bernard Lagat) and set a 3:30 PR on the European circuit. Then he reported to the pre-Olympics camp, where three "national coaches," not O'Connell, were put in charge of the crucial final phase of preparation. Says O'Connell, "Songok was handed off to a different coach each day. Each coach wants to make an impression on the athletes that he is the one responsible for their form, should they succeed, so he runs Songok hard. Same thing with another the next day, and another the next day." In addition, the camp was held in Nairobi. For distance work, the runners were driven to a coffee plantation, where chemicals are used so freely that the plantation's workers were wearing masks as Songok and his teammates ran past. In Athens, Songok reached the 1.500m final, but finished last. (For their part, federation officials blamed Kenyans' poor showing on athletes' lack of restraint at the always-open all-you-can-buffet in the Olympic Village.)

O'Connell's e-mail continues, "I feel that it is time for each athlete, especially the elite ones, to have their own individual coaches, as is happening in many other athletic circles around the world. There is still room for a camp to be organized for a week or so, with a view to familiarizing the athletes with their teammates, discussing tactics and kitting them for the championship. But the tough physical training should be kept to a minimum during that short period.

"Many of the Kenyan athletes are in pretty good shape by the nationals nowadays, and need only polishing in preparation for the big one. There may be a few exceptions where some sustained rigorous training still has to be done, but in my opinion, his/her personal coach knows best the quantity and quality of such training. Here is where knowledge of the athlete starts to take over from knowledge of athletics.

"Holding the cross country trials five weeks before the world cross may be a little too early. My suggestion is that it be held, as Ethiopia is doing, about three weeks before, thus enabling athletes who are in top shape at the trials to maintain that shape right to the world cross.

"Over the years I have been privileged to handle may of Kenya's great athletes, and have a good idea of what it entails to reach world level. Anything I do with the athletes under my care is for the betterment of each one of them and the success of the country. Difference with the federation does not mean divisions. But I do feel that there is room for revision and, perhaps, a basic overhaul, of our national training camp system. The sport has changed greatly over the past decade or so, and our response to it, in terms of training, has to also change."

(Posted May 25, 2005)