Kiplimo, Cheptegei eying Olympics medals today afternoon in 10,000m men’s final



 

Uganda’s long distance stars will make their first appearance in Tokyo in the 10,000m men’s final today on the first day of athletics competitions having lived through curling, sailing, equestrian et al over the past week.

Joshua Cheptegei, Jacob Kiplimo and Stephen Kissa will be in the race today afternoon at 2:30PM EAT.

 

Today matters the most for Uganda’s hopes of adding to the two Olympic Gold medals won by John Aki-Bua (1972) and Stephen Kiprotich (marathon).

 

Cheptegei will start the race as favourite. His resume in the 10,000m demands that. He holds the world record set last year in Valencia, Spain when he did 26 minutes and 11 seconds. It had stood for 15 years.

 

In doing so, he became the 10th man in history to hold the 5,000 and 10,000m world records concurrently, both set in 2020.

 

Before that, the 24-year old won the World Junior Championship Gold seven years ago in Eugene, USA.

 

The growth saw him add a 5,000 and 10000m double at the 2018 Commonwealth Games plus a world title in the latter race at the 2019 World Athletics Championships.

 

Despite his successes in the 5,000m, it’s the 25-lap race where Cheptegei can be called the undisputed king – the best in the world. He belongs to a galaxy of a select few – the biggest sports personalities presently.

 

His biggest rival for this Gold is Kiplimo, whose personal best time of 26 minutes, 33 seconds and 93-hundreth of a second, is the second best among the 25 starters. A 1-2 finish would give Uganda Gold and Silver.

 

On May 19, Kiplimo set the seventh fastest time over the 10,000m at the 60th Golden Spike in Ostrava, Czech Republic.

 

Robust Stephen Kissa will be required to help break down the field over the first half of the race with a tense pace before Cheptegei launches an assault for gold.

 

 

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