Athletics Kenya Justifies Hosting Trials for World Championships in the US

Barnaba Korir

Athletics Kenya Justifies Hosting Trials for World Championships in the US

Abigael Wafula 12:45 - 15.06.2025

Barnaba Korir has defended Athletics Kenya's decision to hold the 5000m and 10,000m trials in the US.

Athletics Kenya Nairobi chair Barnaba Korir has defended the reason why the federation opted to host the women’s 5000m and men’s 10,000m trials for the World Championships at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene on July 7.

Athletics Kenya shared a press release a few days ago, informing athletes who wish to represent Kenya in the two events to be aware of the venue change.

The move led to protests among several athletes who believed that the move came on short notice and pointed out that it was unfair.

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One athlete explained that they should have included the event in their calendar of events, which was unveiled in 2024.

Barnaba Korir Defends Decision to Host Trials in the US

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Barnaba Korir.

The Kip Keino Classic director revealed that they wanted to give more athletes to try and hit the qualifying mark or even close to that time so that they can have a variety of athletes competing for the top three slots.

The World Championships national trials are scheduled for June 26, and Barnaba Korir believes that it is too soon and will deny most athletes a chance to compete and hopefully qualify for the World Championships.

Barnaba Korir pointed out that at the moment, very few athletes have qualified for the World Championships and selecting those few would come out as unfair.

He revealed that they also want to give the athletes who have yet to honour the Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya’s testing rules to wind up.

“Rule 15 says that for you to run for the trials, there are conditions that an athlete has to meet. One of the conditions is that you have to be tested three times, and you need to have qualified for the World Championships, because if you have not qualified, then there is no business running there,” Barnaba Korir told NTV.

“If we go now for the trials, we will have only six athletes running on the track because they have already met he qualification and can just be selected and that’s it.

“We will lock the others out who wanted to have an opportunity. So, we said, we want to give those who are closer to the time an opportunity to qualify.”

Some of the top stars who will be in action at the trials include double Olympic champion Beatrice Chebet, Margaret Chelimo, and Lilian Kasait, among others.

For the men’s 10,000m, Nicholas Kimeli, Daniel Mateiko and Stanley Waithaka are some of the athletes who will be looking to make a mark.

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