NAIROBI, Kenya, Sep 28 – Athletics Kenya (AK) has protested over the mishandling of Kenyan athlete Recho Kosgei at Warsaw Marathon on Sunday where the athlete collapsed with a near-three-minute lead and about a half-mile to go.
The AK president Lt. Gen (Rtd) Jackson Tuwei said they have written a letter to the race organizers demanding for answers after Kosgei failed to get urgent medical attention after she collapsed a few metres to the finish line.
Tuwei said AK has questioned why there were no medical personnel at the vicinity despite the race being an International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) bronze label event.
The president threatened that AK will not clear Kenyans to compete in future Warsaw Marathon races if no good explanation is given.
“We are yet to get a response but will follow it up as we will also take up the issue with IAAF,” he said.
Tuwei was speaking during the launch of the AK 2017/2018 Calendar of events at Riadha House in Nairobi.
In the calendar, AK is lining up its calendar of events in preparation for seven major international and continental events.
The international and continental events are IAAF World Indoor championships in Birmingham, England on March 1-4, 2018, Africa Cross Country in Chlef, Algeria on March 17, IAAF World Half Marathon in Valencia, Spain (March 24).
Other major events are the Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia (April 8-15), Africa Senior Athletics Championships in Delta State, Nigeria (August 1-5) and Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires, Argentina on October 6-18.
The AK senior vice president in charge of competitions Paul Mutwii said the calendar track and field season will begin in November unlike before where it usually starts in March.
“We were forced to make the changes because the Commonwealth Games have been brought forward from the traditional month of August now to April,” he said.
He said the first round of the track and field season will begin in November and end in April and the second one to begin in May after the Commonwealth Games to pave way for the Africa Senior Athletics Championships preparations.
Mutwii said during the first round of the season they will only hold weekend meetings which will culminate with the trials to select athletes for Australia.
“In the first round of the season we will not hold county, regional, affiliates and national championships because it will be congested whereby we shall be holding the track and field and cross country weekend meetings concurrently,” he said.
He said in the second round it will begin with AK weekend meetings before going to the sub county, county, regional, affiliates and national cum trials.
