Kenya dominates in Stockholm race

By James Waindi and IAAF

Isaiah Kiplangat Koech beat Ethiopia’s Dejen Gebremeskel in a sprint finish to win the 3, 000m race at the X-Galan Indoor Championships held in Stockholm, Sweden on Thursday night.

Koech, who won gold in the 3, 000m race at the 2009 World Youth Championships in Brixen, Italy, clocked 7:33.55 to win the race, while Gebremeskel finished second in 7:34.14.

Former Commonwealth 5, 000m gold medalist Augustine Choge, who was named in Kenya’s team to this year’s World Indoor Championships set for Istanbul, Turkey between March 9 and 11, was third in a time of 7:34.42.

World 2010 world cross country championships gold medalist Caleb Ndiku, who also won 1, 500m gold at last year’s All Africa Games in Maputo, finished fourth in 7:35.42.

Boaz Lalang, who won 800m gold at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in India, could only manage a sixth position in the 800m race in a time of 1:47.41. Ethiopia’s Mohamed Aman won the race in 1:45.84.

Meanwhile, World 1,500m champions Asbel Kiprop and David Rudisha will have their first outings of the season at their preferred Olympic distances at the Melbourne Track Classic on March 3. This will be the opening meeting of the 2012 IAAF World Challenge.

Kiprop will defend his Olympic 1,500m title in London later this year, Rudisha will bid to complete a triple crown of accomplishments by adding the Olympic 800m gold medal to his 2010 World records and 2011 IAAF World Championship title.

World Challenge

The Melbourne Track Classic is the first of 15 meetings of the IAAF World Challenge series of one-day competitions which has stops around the globe in all six IAAF Areas. The series of invitational events concludes in Rieti, Italy on 9 September.

Since bursting onto the international athletics stage in 2007, a year which began with his victory in the junior race at the IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Mombasa, Asbel Kiprop’s progress has not been without setback.

At times seemingly sublimely indifferent to tactical considerations, Kiprop was fourth in the 1,500m at successive World championships in Osaka 2007 and Berlin 2009.

In the former, he did too much, trying to lead through the last 700 metres, and in the latter he left his run too late and was forced too wide.

In between Kiprop won the Olympic gold medal, but he spoke in Melbourne this week of his lack of experience at that time.

"When I came onto the athletics scene in 2007 I was childish in athletics, I had no skills at all, no experience. I was just happy to run on the track with those guys like Daniel Kipchirchir Komen," Kiprop told IAAF website.