MIRAMAS, France, Sept 7 – Excitement levels are palpable in the French city of Miramas where Team Kenya has elected to pitch camp for its pre-Olympic training starting February next year.
Miramas is a sleepy territory of Southern France’s Alpes-Cote d’zur region and boasts 34 sports venues sanctioned by the Paris Olympics organizers as preparation centres.
And as Athletic Club Miramas president Christophe Catoni so succinctly says “I rate Kenyan enthusiasm highly; they’ll get more medals at the Olympics when this camp ends.”
With a population of about 27,000, Miramas, which is close by the Mediterranean coast with little or no interference or disturbance, Catoni is optimistic that Kenyan athletes will savor an opportunity of a lifetime.
The City of Miramas has invested a lot and are ready to welcome Team Kenya ahead of Paris 2024.
Catoni goes on to explain: “We are preparing for Team Kenya and we have given them a place to stay and very good coaches. We have state-of-the-art health facilities and Miramas will have everything good for Kenya come February.”
But Catoni clarified that his Club is not looking for athletes from Kenya to come and train at the club.
“But when they are around and need help, we always come through. We also make them feel at home and assist them where possible. This is no doubt Kenya’s second home,” Catoni added.
“For us, it’s an honor to have athletes like Omanyala staying and training in Miramas. Omanyala is a world-class sprinter and his presence here has already created immense buzz on print and electronic media.”
Catoni: “Omanyala has already inspired several new local athletes who are now eager to associate with his celebrity status; and he signed countless autographs when he came here prior to the World Athletics Championships in Budapest.”
Asked how the relationship between the club and National Olympic Committee of Kenya (NOC-K) came to fruition, Catoni went on: “We started the relationship between Kenya and Miramas about two years ago and this was the reason that saw Omanyala come here for high performance training.”
“Another reason is that the Mayor of Miramas here has a soft spot for Kenyan athletes and the residents of this sporting town are talking about Kenyan runners all the time.”
Catoni reveals that the next reason was because they started indoor training which indeed triggered lots of interaction and interest from Kenyan sporting authorities and athletes.
The Club is the home of ten Kenyans; Ferdinand Omanyala, 400m hurdles semi-finalist Wiseman Were, 400m runner Elkanah Chemelil, Kiprono Menjo, Joseph Koech, Sheila Chebet, Aureleria Kiptui, Abraham Kiprop, Zedy Chengwani and Anthony Kirui.
The Club also prides of French’s top youngster Stephen Mailagi, who won silver in the shot put at the French Athletics Championships in 2018.
-Patrice Buffet-
Meanwhile, on his part, Director Sportif Miramas, Patrice Buffet has vowed to give Kenya its best preparations including an invite to some of the athletes to the World Athletics Indoor Tour in Miramas February next year.
“Kenyan athletes training here will have advantage because it is a good place to acclimatize, it’s summer now sometimes like last week the temperatures rose up to 40 degrees, next year during the Olympics it will maybe the same since we are not so far from Paris,” Patrice said.
The program has already started with the taekwondo duo of Olympian Faith Ogallo and Jully Musangi already in Miramas for training ahead of the Olympics qualifiers set for February next year.
Shooting team is set to arrive this month (September), basketball teams and some sprinters later in the year before the proper pre-Olympics camp opening in February next year, at least four months before the games.
“It was a pleasure last year to welcome the under-20 Kenyan athletics team preparing for Cali, they gained experience especially in the field events and sprints where we provided coaches. Kenyan athletes are talented but lack techniques due to insufficient field events facilities in Kenya,” he explained.
The Meeting Miramas Metropole, a World Athletics sanctioned event will see Omanyala return to the event for the second edition after succeeding in the inaugural event where he set a National Record in 60m of 6.54 seconds.
“This Meet being a World Athletics Silver Label is good for athletes who may not have met the Olympics qualification standards and for already qualified athletes, it will be a good place to come and see where they will train and the facilities they will use,” Patrice stated.
“Our Club’s relationship with Kenya goes a long way from eight years ago and step by step we showed Kenyans what we can do. The first athlete to engage was Paul Kipsiele Koech in 2019 and then now Omanyala.”
“Kenyans are very friendly and outgoing, we had a lot of countries who wanted to camp in Miramas, Kenya being among the best nation in athletics in the world and with our good facilities we are happy to welcome Kenya,” Patriece concluded.
-Isabelle Rouby-
National Sports Miramas vice-president, Isabelle Rouby is optimistic Kenya will surpass its Tokyo Olympics medal haul of 10, 4 gold, 4 silver and 2 bronze.
“We are here to make Kenyan team be the best and we are going to put new facilities for the team so that we can have many medals at Paris Olympics that is our objective,” she said.
“In Miramas we develop sports and that’s why you see everywhere you go it’s a new facility because we like sports, Miramas is part of the Paris Olympics preparations so the government is part of this process.”
-Alex Isaboke is reporting from Miramas, France-
