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E-mail Xinhua, June 17, 2024
Two-time Olympic champions Faith Kipyegon and Eliud Kipchoge headline Kenya's athletics team to the 2024 Paris Olympics following the conclusion of the two-day Olympic Trials.
So far, Olympics Kenya has confirmed 37 athletes for Paris - 22 men and 15 women - with a reserve each in the men's and women's marathon squads.
However, that is not the final contingent, since other athletes who met the selection criteria of finishing among the top two at the Trials will be allowed to attain the Olympic qualifying standard before the July 15 deadline to punch their tickets.
Having struggled with a hamstring injury, Kipyegon, the Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 women's 1,500m champion, is going for the double in France, having secured qualification in her specialty and the 5,000m on the first outing of her season.
The 30-year-old was in imperious form at the two-day selection event, blasting to a 14:46.28 victory in the longer race on Friday before powering to a high-altitude record 3:53.99 win barely 24 hours later.
"It's almost the middle of the season, but I'm happy I can run a good race," said the four-time world champion, who completed the 1,500m/5,000m double at last year's World Championship in Budapest.
Kipchoge, 39, is the other luminary aiming to become Kenya's first triple Olympic gold winner and the first in men's marathon history at an Olympic Games.
His place in Paris was confirmed at the beginning of last month when the men's and women's marathon teams were named, but questions have been raised about his form, having finished only eighth at the Tokyo Marathon earlier this year.
Besides the decorated pair, teenager Emmanuel Wanyonyi is among Kenya's other exciting prospects in Paris. On Saturday, he propelled himself to No. 3 on the men's 800m all-time list.
The 2023 World Championships silver medalist tore up the track to win his final in 1:41.70 - behind only David Rudisha's 1:40.91 world record set at the London 2012 Olympics, and Denmark's Kenyan-born 800m great Wilson Kipketer, who ran 1:41.11 in 1997.
African men's 100m record holder Ferdinand Omanyala, a Tokyo 2020 Olympics finalist, also set pulses racing when he won the Kenyan trial in a world-leading 9.79 as he bids to be the first sprinter from east Africa to medal at an Olympics.
Another teenager expected to make waves in France is Faith Cherotich, 17, who shocked world record holder Beatrice Chepkoech in the women's 3,000m steeplechase final to nail her Olympic slot.
The clocks returned 9:22.28 against 9:22.76 as the athlete nicknamed 'Last Born' claimed the scalp of her more established senior.
In the women's 800m, world champion Mary Moraa (1:59.35) was beaten to second by unheralded Lilian Odira, who claimed the victory in 1:59.27 to cement her as one to watch out for in Paris.
13 coaches have been named in the traveling squad under Head of Delegation and Athletics Kenya vice-president Paul Mutwii.
Three-time world half marathon champion, former marathon record holder, and seven-time Marathon Majors winner Mary Keitany will debut in Paris as a coach for the Kenya squad.
