2 August 2007
Nairobi — Commonwealth Games 800m women champion Janeth Jepkosgei is focused on winning a world title and says having been selected alone in the race will not affect her performance.
Jepkosgei, who is also the Africa athletics champion faces an acid test in her quest to rule the world over the two laps and conquering both Africa in Mauritius and the Commonwealth Countries in Melbourne. With the All Africa Games over, the focus now shifts to the World Championship which will be held in Osaka, Japan from August 25 to September 2.
Born on December 13, 1983, Jepkosgei is currently concerned with her sprints and wants to improve on it before she leaves for Osaka. However she said that it will be a difficult race and is focussed in qualifying for the finals first before thinking of which medal to win.
"If you look at the athletes I will be running against in Osaka, you will realise that it will be a big battle but I will be looking forward to curve my own space and prove that I am a champion," she said.
Jepkosgei said that it would be good if Athletics Kenya should have included Faith Macharia in the squad to help her in training and also team up with her in Osaka.
"It would be nice if Macharia was in the team. Though I am used to running alone it would have been much better for me if I had a training partner. I expected AK to name her in the squad, she would have been ideal in setting the pace," she said.
She will definitely be under a lot of pressure being the only Kenyan in the team as she seeks qualification through the heats.
Sleepless nights
Among the top athletes expected to give her sleepless nights will be defending champion Zulia Calatayud of Cuba, the 2005 champion. Others are Kenia Sinclair (Jamaica), Tetyana Petlyuk (Ukraine), Zulia Calatayud (Cuba), Hasna Benhassi (Morocco), European Champion Olga Kotlyarova, Oksana Zbrozhek (Russia) and former world and Olympic champion Maria Mutola (Mozambique).
Jepkosgei has a personal best time of 1:56.66 which she set in Lausanne, Switzerland last year. She will be reporting to camp at Kasarani today
The African champion jetted in the country last week two, days before the trials from her high altitude (2000m above sea level) base in Crendo, Italy where she had been training. Now she is focused of training at home and is sure the team in camp is the best at the moment and capable of winning medals in Osaka.
Jepkosgei is one of the athletes expected to win gold for Kenya as the country seeks to get back to winning ways over the long and middle distance.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2007 The Nation. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
