Meanwhile, World 800m champion Mary Moraa will miss the championships due to a visa hitch.
By OUR CORRESPONDENT
Team Kenya completed their residential training on Wednesday at the Ulinzi Sports Complex ahead of the World Relays Championships in Guangzhou, China, on May 10-11.
The team pitched camp at the military facility just two days after the national trials of April 11-12 even though they were visiting Karura forest for long morning runs on select days.
The team leaves on Wednesday, 7th May at 6:10 pm aboard Flight QR 1336 via Doha to reach China on Thursday afternoon.
Coach Stanley Towet is hopeful they will put their days of tough training to good use when they compete at the seventh edition of the global showpiece. He observed remarkable improvements in his athletes.
“Training has been smooth from the word go and I have witnessed a lot of improvement in the athletes,” said Towet.
“For example, when we started the camp, the athletes were clocking over 12 seconds in the 120m sprints but this has dropped to 11.5. This gives us hope of performing well in the 4x100m.” “We have done most of what we expected to even though we will tune up once in China to shake off the jet lag and acclimatise,” he said.
Towet hopes to have longer residential training in the future. “Relays require at least a month in training to harmonise all the aspects, especially baton flow in the 4x100m,” said Towet. The credentials of some of the athletes is encouraging, he observed.
“We have three 4x400m men who have clocked 44 seconds over 400m and three women who have ran 51 seconds,” he said.
“We have very high hopes about them qualifying for the World Championships in the 4x400m and the 4x400m mixed relays.” Isaac Omurwa, one of the youngest members of Team Kenya, is thrilled to make his first senior outing.
Training with sprinting old guards has whet his appetite for glory and is already thinking about the September World championships in Tokyo.
“The camp has been good. The coaches and athletes have been cooperative. I can’t complain,” said Omurwa.
“We have hopes that we will bring back good results from China. The target for all the athletes is qualification for the World Championships in Tokyo, Japan, in September.”
“This is my first World (Relay) Championships and I am happy about it. I have a lot of expectations, what to see, what to do. I will be running amongst senior athletes like Omanyala (Ferdinand), Wiseman (Were) and Mweresa (Boniface), great athletes who have done great things in the sport. I am looking up to them and they have been telling me what to do and what not to. I have learnt a lot from them.”
Commonwealth Games 100m champion Ferdinand Omanyala, Olympian Zablon Ekwam and coach Simon Riga are already in China as part of the Team Kenya advance party.
