Nairobi Continental Tour preparations enter crucial stage ahead of October 3

Cabinet Secretary for Sports Amina Mohamed (right) with athletics legend Kipchoge Keino. [Courtesy]

It’s race against time as Nairobi gets ready to host world beaters in the World Athletics Continental Tour Gold series next Saturday.

Preparations for the inaugural edition entered homestretch yesterday as organisers launched the event slated for October 3.

The organisers are racing against time to deliver a successful one-day event, which will see over 150 global stars grace the event.

While attending the launch, Cabinet Secretary for Sports Amina Mohammed assured of hosting a successful event.

“It’s great honour for our country to host this level of competition. This come after many years of middle and long distances prowess,” said Mohammed. 

“We want give the world the best event as part of an initiative to bid for the hosting rights of 2025 World championships.”

Kip Keino, who attend the launch, urged the government to improve on the infrastructure and build facilities in schools in order to encourage Kenyan youth to embrace sports.

“This is great event, we are glad as a nation to be hosting such high caliber of events. My call is for the government to improve the facilities and support the youth to take sport as professional career,” said Keino.

Athletics Kenya President Jackson Tuwei, disclosed that athletes entry will be closed on Friday this week.

The Kenyan entrants have been selected based on their performances at previous international championships including the 2019 World Athletics Championships in Doha, Qatar, Africa Athletics Championships as well the national athletics championships.

“We are ready to host an excellent event, we already have provisional entry which will be released tomorrow (today) and all the entry  will be closed on September, 25,” said Tuwei. 

The championship is meant to offer athletes quality competition opportunities.

The inaugural 2020  world continual tour was set to be held in 4 continents: Africa, Asia, Europe and North America.

The Nairobi leg is the  7th event whereas 3 other legs in China, Jamaica and Netherlands have been cancelled following the global outbreak of coronavirus.