At the World Cross Country Championships, which ended a few weeks ago, the Kenyan team won eight gold medals out of a possible eight, thereby once again confirming its status as the most resilient athletics country in the world. Probably every athletics fan has wondered at least once in his life why Kenyan runners win the biggest running competitions with such ease and with such a margin. The next article, in which the director of the IAAF Moscow Development Center Vadim Zelichenok talks about the secrets of the “Kenyan phenomenon” was published on the pages of the SportExpress newspaper in the summer of 2008.
When I asked the Director of Development of the International Athletics Federation IAAF Elio Locatelli, is it possible to get some materials about the “Kenyan phenomenon”, he just laughed: “No one will write anything to you. You need to see this. So get ready, let’s go to Kenya.”. However, I received the first information from Locatelli even before the trip. "Keep in mind, he warned, to talk about the 'Kenyan phenomenon' is essentially wrong. We are talking only about a tiny part of Kenya: without exception, all Kenyan runners who have achieved something were born, raised and became high-class athletes in the city Eldoret or its environs. 110 thousand people live there, less than one percent of the country's population has not yet been excluded.".
The reason to visit Eldoret soon presented itself: there was an opening training center IAAF. Of course, it is impossible to create a complete picture of the “Kenyan phenomenon” in three days. But we managed to make a few short sketches that could at least slightly lift the veil.
HOW THEY LIVE
A few words about Eldoret itself. The city is located three hundred kilometers northwest of Nairobi, almost on the equator, at an altitude of 2000 m above sea level (and the routes where runners train in some places lie at an altitude of up to 2500-2800 m). I must say that here you practically don’t feel like you’re in the middle mountains (I have something to compare with, I’ve been to Johannesburg, Mexico City, and Tsakhkadzor). It feels like you are in Kislovodsk, only the air is even fresher. The weather in these places varies little throughout the year - 23..25 degrees in the shade during the day, cool at night (after all, mountains), but pleasant. Sun all year round rises at 7 am and sets at 7 pm, there is almost no precipitation, with the exception of the conditional rainy season (there are few of them) from April to June. The ecological situation is the most favorable without any industry, the air is clean, everything that people eat walks, runs and grows right there. The food, by the way, is simple, but tasty and always fresh. There are almost no bodies of water, so fish dishes You won’t see it on the table of the average Kenyan.
Frankly speaking, the impression of Eldoret and especially the suburbs is depressing: it is not even poverty, but misery. But there is an elite area where they live famous runners. Athletes who have achieved significant success, but are not among the elite, have decent cottages, the best have two-three-story houses, and top-class marathon runners Moses Tanui and Tekla Lorupe have real palaces. Let me note that all the strongest Kenyan runners are also businessmen, owners of vast lands and herds. The wealth in which they live is an additional incentive for novice athletes, whose natural desire to run very soon develops into a life goal when they see successful idols.
HOW THEY TRAIN
There is an opinion that Kenyans start running almost earlier than walking and, starting from the age of 6-7 years, run 12-15 km daily to and from school. I’ll say right away that I haven’t seen anything like this, although I’ve traveled a lot on the roads in the vicinity of Eldoret. Yes, some ran (there were a minority of these), some walked, some rode a bicycle or a car. The age at which you start training varies greatly: there are many examples where athletes already at the age of 17-18 reach the world elite, but there are no fewer than those who at this age are just starting to run seriously. Training groups are often formed according to family principles: the younger brother joins the older brother, the cousin joins him, etc.
As I have already noted, most Kenyans live in difficult conditions, therefore, as soon as athletes begin to show more or less decent results, they move to college dormitories or sports camps, which large companies have recently begun to open. I managed to visit the best of them (according to the Kenyans themselves), created by Fila a few kilometers from Eldoret. Two rows of barracks, each of which is divided into several blocks. The block has two single rooms, a shower room and a toilet. The rooms are so small that only a bed and a bedside table fit in there. Clothes and sneakers have to be dried under the windows. But under the African sun, all bacteria probably die!
There is a large vegetable garden on the territory, the harvest from which goes to the table of the athletes. There are internal rules at the entrance. One of them states that all outsiders are required to leave the camp no later than 17:00. The training track starts at the gate. Its length is 16 kilometers, it passes at an altitude of 2000 to 2500 meters. Twice a week, each athlete must run it all the way there and back, that is, cover 32 kilometers. Running training is preceded by numerous general developmental exercises; “stretching” and special strength training complexes are widely used.
The soil on the track is excellent, reminiscent of a cinder surface (from where, by the way, it is brought to the only stadium in Eldoret). They say that the path is especially good after rain: it becomes elastic, like tartan, but retains all the advantages of a natural surface. This protects against injuries, which often results from running in large volumes on synthetics.
LIVING LEGEND
There could be no two opinions about who should head the IAAF training center: of course, Kipchogo Keino. A legendary runner who won two gold, a silver and a bronze Olympic medals in Mexico City and Munich, chairman of the NOC of Kenya, member of the IOC... With all this, Keino manages to actively engage in charity work. Twenty years ago, he took into his family two girls from Uganda, whose parents were victims of repression during the dictatorship. Go Amina. Then he created an orphanage, where more than 70 people now live. In 1999, Keino opened a school with over 200 children.
The Kip Keino Children's Home occupies a huge site that now houses the IAAF Centre. Of course, this is not a five-star hotel, but the conditions are not spartan: rooms for 2-3 people, showers and toilets, in one of the buildings there is a library and a video library, there is gym And basketball court, a sauna is being built. In any case, Olympic champion Dieter Baumann has stayed here several times; American runners come here to train, not to mention athletes from African countries. At their service are nine (!) cross-country tracks ranging from 4 to 8 km in length with various terrain and artificial obstacles, on which not only training, but also competitions are held.
Needless to say that, among other things, the center has a huge farm where they grow corn, potatoes, cabbage, tomatoes, other vegetables, pineapples, bananas, mangoes and papaya. By the way, everyone eats at the same table, both Keino’s own family and the athletes living in the camp.
SIX TERMS
If anyone can explain the "Kenyan phenomenon", it is John Belzian. He is the patriarch of not only Kenyan but all African athletics. And at the same time not African. Belzian came to Kenya from England in 1959 when he was 30 years old. About no athletics in the modern sense, Kenyans had no idea back then. And just five years later, and primarily through the efforts of the English coach, Wilson Kiprugut at the Tokyo Games brought Kenya its first Olympic medal bronze at 800 meters. And four years later, in Mexico City, real success came to the Kenyans, which has always accompanied them since then.
It is not surprising that when the IAAF opened a regional development center in Nairobi in 1987, it was Beelzian who was appointed as its director. He still holds this post today. The program he developed has borne fruit not only in Kenya, but also in Ethiopia (whose runners are known to often outperform the Kenyans), and in recent years in Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Eritrea.
When I asked Velzian what factors could be considered decisive in the success of Kenyan runners, he listed six: genetics (strange, isn’t it, all the athletes come from one small area where there is practically no “fresh blood”); and is never late for training); motivation; training in groups; natural nutrition (the Englishman especially highlighted dairy products).
THEY ALSO HAVE DISADVANTAGES!
The achievements of Kenyan runners are amazing, but, in my opinion, there is still considerable reserve in their preparation. Firstly, there are practically no truly qualified trainers in Kenya. Not a single athletics coach (and not a single athlete, by the way) receives a salary from the state. The role of mentors is most often performed by a kind of “playing coach” experienced athletes ending their own careers. Now, for example, this Moses Tanui And Moses Kiptanui. Naturally, apart from personal example, they have, in general, nothing to offer young athletes. However, recently the situation has been changing. Leading managers working with large groups of Kenyan runners such as Kim McDonald, Jos Hermens, Giovanni Di Madonna, began to pay for the work of coaches in their groups (note: below is a photo of the Nike office in Eldoret). In the center of Kipchogo Keino, 1988 Olympic champion Paul Ereng will work under a contract with the IAAF.
Second point. Almost constant training in large groups, without specialization, leads to the fact that the load is high, but average. It is no coincidence that the Kenyans achieved the greatest success in the 3000-meter steeplechase and 5000-meter distances at which such training is optimal. In middle-distance running, such work is often excessive, and in 10,000 m and in the marathon it is insufficient. The disadvantage of such a system is that some athletes cannot choose “their” distance for a long time, showing relatively low (by Kenyan standards, of course) results.
There is practically no planning of the training process. In response to the question whether athletes have training programs and is it possible to look at them, John Belzian gave the following example: When Iapetus Kimatui after the successful 1999 season, I began preparing for the Olympic Games in Sydney, I also asked to show him training plan. He hesitated for a long time, but eventually showed it. It turned out that this was the same plan that I had drawn up before the 1964 Olympics for Wilson Kipprugut...
The very strict “American” selection system also does not serve Kenyan runners well. At the Kenya Championships, all runners, regardless of title, are required to start, and only the top three in each event go to the World Championships or Olympics. And every year there appear young athletes who have not yet been invited to commercial competitions in Europe and who therefore have the opportunity to purposefully prepare for the selection. As a result, they often end up on the team, “knocking out” top-class masters from it. And then, at the main start, they look unconvincing. This can be seen at every major competition: two Kenyans are fighting for medals, and the third either lags behind or does not make it to the finals at all.
And the last thing, but this is already true, for fun. Velzian told me that Kenyans abroad find it difficult to fill out a form at a hotel: they do not understand what to write in the “last name” column. It turns out that what we think of as a surname can mean anything in Kenya. For example, that a person was born before sunrise, or at noon, or at sunset. Famous runners Ismail Kirui and Richard Chelimo are brothers, they have the same mother and father. So our old joke about how a brother disowns his brother, claiming that they “are not even namesakes”, will simply not be understood in Kenya.
In general, you can study and describe the “Kenyan phenomenon” as much as you like, but I think it’s best to somehow gather the courage and send a group of our runners and coaches to Eldoret. Let them train for 3-4 weeks with the Kenyans, compete and try to understand for themselves: why do they run so fast in Kenya?
Prepared by: Sergey Koval
History of Kenyan running
The slogan used by the organizers of the local, 35th World Cross Country Championships in Mombasa (Kenya), on March 27, 2007, was: “The pride of Kenya is invested in this weekend.” Finally, a nation whose men's team won the team cup in this discipline for 18 years in a row, from 1986 to 2003, having the most large number victories in a row for the entire international sports history, gets a chance to host the world championship in Mombasa. For Kenya, this means that Cross Country has “come home.”
And the Kenyans will once again defend their title, trying to show their superiority over everyone, in the men's total 12 km, after the championship in Fukuoka (Japan) last year, there follows a two-year dual reign between the Kenyans and their constant great rivals, the Ethiopians, who now hold the palm. . The renewal of that rivalry will certainly be one of the most anticipated moments of this Saturday's run.
But what no one will ever be able to answer is how Kenyans will be able to dominate such a global event in Mombasa, which attracts runners from 66 countries. In fact, the big mystery is how one small group of the entire Kenyan people managed to keep such a large number of world record holders, world champions and Olympic champions on the team, if the first athletes from East Africa began to be sent to international competitions just under 50 years ago.
We will not be mistaken if we say that Kenya has never been a rich country. On average, a Kenyan earns $1,000 a year, but compared to other African countries, Kenyans have a number of advantages. The most important of them is the ability to run.
Many Kenyans live in a rich and fertile corner of the country in the southwest, where some of the best farmland in Africa is found.
British colonies
Kenya was a rich country, the Kenyans were able to convince the British colonialists to build railway along the Kenya-Uganda route from Mombasa to the Indian Ocean along the shores of Lake Victoria just a century ago. The Kenyans called on European settlers who planted coffee and tea plantations, which later became known as the “White Country,” to pay for the construction. Of course, everything was built thanks to “cheap” African labor.
But in addition to the fact that the settlers planted coffee and tea plantations, they gave the Kenyans sports such as golf, tennis, cricket (Kenyans take part in the cricket world cups that take place on the Caribbean coast), horse racing and polo for the upper social classes . They also encouraged Africans to play football. It is still believed that the most popular types sports in Kenya - boxing and athletics(running).
Chepkwonyi and Moyoro - International Pioneers
In the beginning, sports in Kenya were limited to the army, police and running missionary schools, but at the time of independence in 1963, Kenya sent a small team, mostly runners and boxers, to two Olympics and three Empire Games.
Lazarus Chepkwonyi is recorded as the first Kenyan runner to compete in Europe, in the “white” city of London, over a distance of 6 miles. It was in July 1954, when he was part of the Kenyan team and qualified for the Empire Games in Vancouver.
Running barefoot, Chepkwonom managed to complete that race, but the next day, at 3 miles, his teammate Nyandiko Majoro was swept in a race in which Freddie Green and Chris Cutaway both set the world record. Majoro, in the 1950s, broke the European prejudice that Africans could only be sprinters, finishing third and establishing national record with a time of 13:54:8.
Majoro of Kenya, in as fine a style as I have ever seen, with the right training program suited to the competition, is one of the top contenders of many of the world's runners, wrote PW "Jimmy" Green in the next edition of A Sports Weekly.
Norris McReiter, one of the timekeepers, wrote presciently that a very talented runner from Kenya had emerged, his name was Nyandiko Majoro. Kenyan athletes have arrived on the world stage.
Majoro was prominent representative Kenya at cross-country distances for several years. He finished seventh in the 5K at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, beating Cataway by almost 10 seconds. Two years later he ran in London again and finished second at the AAA Championships with a time of 13:34:8, setting a Kenyan record. Also in 1958, Arere Anentia won bronze medal at a 6-mile event in Cardiff, at which time Bartonjo Rotich was third in the 440-yard hurdles, the first medals won by Kenyans at an international competition.
For many years, Kenyans have been considered unsurpassed and the fastest runners in the world. This motivates professional athletes to new running techniques and preparation for competitions - but for some reason it does not bring any special results. What is the secret of Kenyan runners, why are they so resilient and fast, how do they prepare for long and short distances- maybe some of the secrets can be useful to us too. If you don’t run a marathon or win gold medals at world competitions, then at least learn to run faster than usual.
Running history
Man has always run - while hunting or for his own pleasure. Story professional running officially started in Ancient Greece. Then one of the warriors, Pheidippides, was sent to report the victory of the Athenians over the Persians - and he had to cover a distance of 42 kilometers 195 m to the city of Athens from Marathon. This is what marathon runners now run. In this sporting discipline different years athletes from different countries, but for more than half a century the entire podium has gone to runners from Kenya.
Running today
Recently it has become very fashionable to run a marathon - people do it like professional athletes, as well as ordinary people who like to run. Marathons are held in major cities around the world - and they attract thousands of participants. All recent world records belong to runners from Kenya. The latest achievement belongs to a representative of this small African country. Kenyan Eliud Kichpoge ran in Berlin in September 2018 marathon distance in two hours one minute and 39 seconds.
Training for long distances usually involves many factors - the success of the race depends on physical condition athlete, general conditions life, approach to training and nutritional habits. Genetic predisposition to running is also very important - but runners from other countries, of course, are powerless to change anything.
Physiology of Kenyan runners
The largest number of good runners come from the Kalenji tribe: their people make up about 15% of the Kenyan population. A long time ago, the ancestors of the tribe lived at the foot of the mountains, but then moved higher into the mountains. This happened gradually, the organisms of this people were constantly rebuilt to adapt to the changing external conditions life - and the structure of the body acquired recognizable and specific features over time.
Kalenji people are usually short in stature, with long and thin hands and legs. The reduced body surface area dissipates excess heat faster - a clear advantage when running long distances. Other physiological feature runners of the Kalenji tribe - they use oxygen very efficiently and economically when moving. This unique feature arose as a result of people living at an altitude above two thousand meters above sea level - the air there, of course, is much less saturated with oxygen than below.
Need to run far from birth
Residents of Kenya have always had to run long distances to feed themselves and their loved ones - which means simply to survive. Hunting in an African country sometimes comes down to the physical exhaustion of the victim - they simply chase him until he is completely exhausted.
Cattle breeders have to travel tens of kilometers a day to transport their herds, and children walk approximately the same distance to school and back.
Features of Kenyan training
The approach to running is very simple. All you have to do is just run, taking steps one after another. Runners from other countries use heart rate monitors, various applications on smartphones, check charts, tracking progress - and at this time they forget about the main thing, that is, actually, about running.
According to Kenyans, you need to be very careful about your body - and be able to listen to it very carefully. The body usually signals quite clearly its needs and reactions to physical activity- including heavy ones.
In Kenya, in addition, it is customary to practice group training - beginners run alongside Olympic champions and ordinary tourists. This allows you to share your experience in practice and discover new sports talents.
Features of the diet of Kenyans
The secret of the Kenyan diet is very simple: nothing superfluous. They mainly eat corn, rice, legumes and green vegetables. This diet plan provides a person with a sufficient amount of fiber and complex carbohydrates with low fat content.
Athletes from Kenya never use special energy drinks or protein supplements. The only drink available to them is tea with milk, which they drink at large quantities. This drink promotes the removal of sweat, reducing the body temperature that rises during running. Muscle relaxation is caused by masala tea - it reduces pain the next day after training.
Over the past few years we have seen a surge in distance running performance, with most of these results shown Kenyan runners. One has only to open the statistics of results throughout history, and we will see that in the men’s marathon, only the Ethiopian Kenenisa Bekele wedged itself into the top 10 among Kenyans with a result of 2:03:03, shown in Berlin in 2016. How world record holders in running train in Kenya, says Evgenia Zhgir, MSMC in marathon, curator of the RunCzech Racing project, author of a series of articles.
Who trains
You will be surprised, but few Kenyans train under the guidance of a coach; most of them train in a group of athletes, where the training plan is drawn up by the athletes themselves or by the leading athlete-leader. Where, you ask, do athletes have such competence? The fact is that Kenyans are a very open people, and more experienced athletes are happy to share their experience with younger ones. In general, every runner in Kenya, even beginners, will tell you that if it’s Tuesday, then it’s fartlek, if it’s Saturday, then it’s a long one. A very special running culture has developed here over the years.
As for groups that work under the guidance of a coach, the program depends on the coach. There are successful coaches of local origin in Kenya, and there are also Europeans. The most successful and famous among European coaches is the Italian Renato Canova, who has been working in Kenya for many years. Renato worked for some time in Ethiopia and even in China, but still returned to Kenya, explaining that it was easier and more pleasant to work there.
Among the local trainers, Patrick Sang, perhaps, stands out, his most famous student - Olympic champion in the marathon, owner and winner of many prestigious marathons, including in Berlin and London. If Renato Canova adheres to the “intensity” approach in his work, then Patrick Sang follows the “volume” approach. Both approaches have their place, and both bring results. However, the “intensity” approach is more traumatic, and if you look at Canova’s group, many of his athletes are plagued by injuries, some recover and return, others do not. The “volume” approach is softer, and most athletes use precisely this principle, gradually increasing intensity.
Groups that train independently are no less successful. For example, former world record holder in the marathon Wilson Kipsang organizes his training process himself; world record holder in the marathon Dennis Kimetto also trains in a group without a coach.The key point in training process What Kenyan runners do is work in a group, where everyone supports and “pull” each other.
Training schedule
The most common training schedule looks like this:
- Monday – developmental cross-country;
- Tuesday – fartlek;
- Wednesday – recovery cross-country;
- Thursday – speed work at the stadium;
- Friday – recovery cross-country;
- Saturday – long tempo;
- Sunday is rest.
As a rule, most runners do 2 workouts a day: the morning one – according to the scheme described above, and the evening one – jogging, general developmental exercises and stretching. Sometimes athletes change Tuesday with Thursday, because... the stadium is simply not able to accommodate several hundred athletes at the same time. Therefore, the groups agree among themselves who comes to the stadium when.
Runners most often leave for morning training no later than 6:00 am and do not even have breakfast before training - first work, then food.
Where do they train?
The important point is that the vast majority of Kenyan runners train exclusively on dirt roads and dirt stadiums. Not because there is no asphalt or stadiums with professional surfaces, but because dirt roads are softer and less dangerous. Only a few athletes combine dirt and asphalt, mostly during the rainy season, when dirt roads are washed away, but you still need to train somehow.
Types of training
Athletes begin preparing for the season with cross-country and long low-intensity runs, then include fartlek, and then speed work, gradually increasing intensity. Fartleks vary in different time periods, the rest between working periods most often does not exceed 1 minute. The number of repetitions depends on how many kilometers are planned for the fartlek, usually 8-10 km. Kenyans, as a rule, do speed work with a fairly short rest, for example, 10x1000 m after 1.5-2 minutes of rest.
Long-term paces are also quite intense: those who are preparing for 10 km and half marathons do paces from 15 to 30 km, marathon runners from 25 to 40 km. For example, while training for the Tokyo Marathon in 2017, Wilson Kipsang held the final 35km pace in 1 hour 59 minutes, an average of 3:24/km, at an altitude of 2,300 m above sea level. Kipsang won the Tokyo marathon that year with a result of 2:03:58.
How to recover
How do Kenyans recover from such stress? By the way, they don’t go to the sauna. Massage, yes, at least once a week, if finances allow. And, of course, sleep and quality nutrition. Sleep, as they say, is the best recovery. Large sports management companies organize year-round support for their athletes: massage therapist, physiotherapy. The Normatec device has proven itself very well in athletics; almost all elite athletes use it for recovery.
What about women?
Women's long-distance running received a huge breakthrough in 2017, with 7 world records set by Kenyan runners from April to October. The most sensational was the half marathon in Prague, where Joycilyn Jepkosgei, during the half marathon distance, updated four world achievements at once (10 km, 15 km, 20 km and half marathon), while she became the first woman to run this distance faster than 65 minutes, her result is 1: 04:52. At the end of April, Mary Keitany successfully broke the marathon world record (split start) - 2:17:01. In the fall of the same year, Joycilyn updated the 10 km record, again in Prague, becoming the first woman to run ten out of 30 minutes (29:43), and a month later she improved her half-marathon time by 1 second.
Mary Keitany (world marathon record holder, winner of the London and New York marathons) and Edna Kiplagat ( two-time champion world marathon) with pacemakers during speed training. In general, the training process for women is structured in the same way as for men, with only one difference: women do not train in groups. As a rule, female athletes have one or more pacemakers who accompany them during each training session and set the pace. Many Kenyan runners train under the guidance of their husband-coach. Including Joycelyn Jepkosgei and Mary Keitany: both are trained by their husbands, and Mary’s husband is not only her coach, but also a pacemaker.
And finally, I would like to say about one more driving factor in the Kenyans’ training process, namely motivation. Running is a viable way for Kenyans to earn a living and escape poverty. Unfortunately, many athletes lose motivation as soon as they earn their first decent money and leave the sport, but there are also those for whom running becomes not just income, but a way of self-realization, and then we see such outstanding athletes as Eliud Kipchoge, Wilson Kipsang , Mary Keitany, Joycelyn Jepkosgei and many others.
The statistics are hard to ignore, but this country of 41 million people has dominated the world of distance running for the past 30 years. Pick any stayer's race and you'll find that roughly 80 percent of the winners since the late 1980s have come from Kenya. For example, since 1988, 20 of the 25 first-place men in the Boston Marathon have been Kenyan. Seven of the last 8 London Marathons have been won by Kenyans, the world record for the marathon is held by a Kenyan and this does not take into account the annual victories at various championships. The same goes for Kenyan women, only they started a little later, not winning a marathon until 2000 (possibly due to discriminatory laws and a tradition of forcing girls into marriage, both of which were partially abolished in the 1990s) today they own 6 victories in the last 8 Boston Marathons, a world record in the women's half marathon and many other victories and titles in various competitions.
So what is so unique about this small African country? But if you dig deeper, it becomes even more interesting, because almost all Kenyan runners who became winners and medalists of the Olympic Games and World Championships, and generally achieved something, were born and raised in the Rift Valley (the homeland of homo sapiens). The famous champion cities of Eldored and Iten are also located there.
Over the years, a lot of stereotypes have developed, which we will try to confirm or refute. Many believe that Kenyans become excellent runners because they run several kilometers to and from school every day as children or because they run barefoot, while others attribute this to simple food or high altitude.
But in order to fully study the “Kenyan phenomenon”, we decided to consider in detail every aspect that in one way or another can influence the result.
1. Genetics
In the 2000s, when Kenyans were already firmly entrenched on the podium of almost all the major staying competitions, athletes, coaches and sports doctors from all over the world began to ask questions and try to explain the secret of Kenyan athletes. And one of the main hypotheses that was put forward was as follows: such a clear dominance of Kenyan athletes in long-distance running is a consequence of genetics. However, as it turned out later, this theory did not take root, as it was not supported by scientific evidence.
As a result of many studies, the only thing that could be established is that Kenyan runners have a slightly non-standard body structure; the athletes examined had less body weight for their height, more long legs, shorter torsos and thinner limbs.
One of the researchers said the Kenyans' physical features are "avian-like", noting that these traits make them more efficient runners over long distances. But this ability alone is not enough to beat your colleagues by 5 or more minutes at the finish line of a marathon.
2. Nature
Director of the IAAF Moscow Development Center Vadim Zelichenko, who at one time studied the “Kenyan phenomenon” himself went to Eldoret to see how the future live and train Olympic champions. And this is what he wrote:
“The city is located three hundred kilometers northwest of Nairobi, almost on the equator, at an altitude of 2000 m above sea level (and the routes where runners train reach 2500-2800 m). I must say that the middle mountains are practically not felt - I have something to compare with, I was in Johannesburg, Mexico City, Tsaghkadzor, Cochababme (Bolivia), which are located at an altitude of 1700-2200 m, not to mention La Paz, located at an altitude of 3600 -3800 m. Feels as if you are in Kislovodsk, but the air is even fresher.
The weather is very even throughout the year - during the day in the shade it is 23-25 degrees Celsius, at night it is cool (after all, mountains!), but comfortable. All year round the sun rises at 7 am and sets at 7 pm. There is almost no precipitation; the relative rainy season lasts from April to June. The vegetation is savanna, and higher up in the mountains, closer to 3000 m, the area is wooded. There is no industry, the air is clean, the environmental situation is the most favorable.” To this should also be added an abundance of vegetables and fruits all year round, meat various types(cows, goats, chickens). The food is always simple and fresh, as there are practically no refrigerators. There are practically no fish either.
3. Training
It is worth noting that serious coaches began working with Kenyan athletes literally in the last 10-15 years; before that, most runners determined the quality of their training by its volume. And the most advanced of them trained according to programs from the 70s, which were developed by Soviet and Finnish coaches.
The most important role in the training process is played by very tough competition, which is very evident at the national selection. Regardless of the titles and results at the Kenya Championships, all runners are required to start, and only the first three in each event go to the World Championships and olympic games. And, if given the fact that running for those guys who go to the start is almost the only possible way to get out of poverty, then this also adds crazy motivation.
As soon as athletes begin to show decent results, they go to live in college dormitories or in sports camps, which large sports companies have recently begun to open. Next to the camp there is also a training track equipped with very good soil, which allows athletes to do large volumes with minimal injuries. It is worth refuting another myth that Kenyans run barefoot - this is not entirely true, almost all athletes who train in sports camps, equipped with minimal running equipment.
4. Way of life
Over the years, the most myths have accumulated about the way of life of Kenyan athletes. The most popular of them says that since childhood, Kenyans have been running tens of kilometers every day to and from school, but those who have visited Kenya say the opposite, 14 out of 20 Kenyan runners surveyed said that they rode a bus or bicycle to school , as normal children do.
In Kenya, most people live below the poverty line, but after Kenyan athletes started winning world competitions, every town and village began to have its own elite - those who went to win a world title or some big city marathon and came back with enough money to buy a piece of land, a cow and a big car. The photo shows the area of Eldoret where the star runners live.
Conclusions
The so-called “Kenyan phenomenon” is a huge flywheel that started in the 80s and is now gaining momentum every year. Where at the very beginning many factors that were mentioned above coincided, these were natural conditions, way of life, climate, nutrition and crazy competition in the local championship. Then an unrealistic motivation was added to this, because when a young guy of 15 years old walks past the cool house (by local standards) of a star runner and tries to see through the darkened windows the interior of the new Toyota Land Cruiser parked in the backyard, running becomes the only thing for him purpose and occupation of life. And of course, the best coaches, who every year become more and more active in working with Kenyan athletes.
But this question was answered even more precisely by one of best trainers Kenya, early 2000s, retired Irish priest named Colma, living in Iten.
He said: “Do you want to know what the secret is? But there is no secret.
There is no secret unless you consider the incredible level of dedication, work ethic and dedication that comes from a hard physical life which, as Colm puts it, makes them strong, disciplined and highly motivated. In this situation, each hill conceals a secret and provides an opportunity, almost the only opportunity, for a better life.
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