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Two Kenyan runners selected for IAAF awards
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-10-14 09:24 NAIROBI -- Kenya's Olympic marathon champion Samuel Kamau Wanjiru and Olympic 800m champion Pamela Jelimo have been selected for the IAAF World athlete of the year.
The duo made history at the Beijing Olympics with Wanjiru becoming the first Kenyan to win the marathon gold while Jelimo became the first Kenyan woman to be gold medallist at the games. According to an IAAF news release, the two are in a 20 athlete list for the annual awards. Wanjiru will be up against Jamaican sprint king Usain Bolt who set three world records and won three gold medals in Beijing. The 22 year old Jamaican posted 9.69 seconds in the 100 meters, 19.30 in the 200 meters and was a member of the 4x100 meters relay team that set a new time of 37.10 seconds. Ethiopia's Haile Gebrselassie who became the first man to go under 2:04 in marathon is in the running as is Cuba's Dayron Robles who won the 110meters hurdles Olympic title and set a new World record. Kenenisa Bekele, Bryan Clay (USA), LaShawn Merritt (USA), Irving Saladino (PAN), Andrey Silnov (RUS) and Andreas Thorkildsen (NOR) are among other athletes chasing the awards with Wanjiru. The 19-year-old Jelimo enjoyed a most successful season this year bettering the World junior record, African record and national record no less than five times as winning the IAAF one million US dollar Golden Jackpot. She also won the African title at The African Championships in Addis Ababa. She also posted the fastest time ever run on Kenyan soil clocking 1:57.71 during the national trials. She will face competition from Olympic gold medalist and World record holder Yelena Isinbayeva and Ethiopia's Tirunesh Dibaba who won the 5,000 and 10,000 meters double at the Olympic as well as breaking the 5,000 meters world record. Other top contenders include Russia's Gulnara Galkina Samitova who set anew world record in the women's 3,000 meters steeplechase, Cameroon's Francoise Mbango who became the first woman to defend the triple jump crown at the Olympics and Blanka Vlasic who suffered only two defeats the whole season in women's high jump. Others include Veronica Campbell-Brown who retained her 200 meters Olympic title, Barbora Spotakova who won javelin in Beijing and set a new world record weeks later, Valerie Vili who added the Olympic shot put gold to her world title and Melanie Walker who went the whole season unbeaten in the women's 400 meters hurdles. The winners will be announced at the annual IAAF awards gala dinner in Monte Carlo on November 23. |
