Nairobi — As the countdown to the 20th edition of the StanChart Marathon continues, organisers of the annual road race are not ruling out the possibility of one of the elite runners smashing Kelvin Kiptum's world record set last Sunday at the Chicago Marathon.
Chair of the local organising committee, Peter Gitau, says that would be the greatest thing to happen in the history of the competition, which would be an absolute game changer for them.
"That would be a dream-come-true. I think two things come to mind. One, we are in Kenya...the home of marathoners and a record has been broken. The second thing is that we would be able to have a credible result. That to us is very important as we build the marathon to world standards and get more partners. We will also be able to increase the prize money and also attract more professional runners and build this race to a world class city marathon," Gitau said.
He added the committee have made meticulous preparations to ensure that everything about the marathon is aligned to international standards as per World Athletics' rules concerning road races.
"With the years that have gone by, we have been able to build the standards of the marathon whether in the route measurement, use of technology to make sure that the athletes have credible results. We have been engaging World Athletics through Athletics Kenya. Athletics Kenya have worked hard to ensure that the route measured is certified," he said.
One of the concerns expressed by stakeholders was the confusion witnessed at the finish line at last year's competition where certain media struggled to take pictures.
Commenting on these bottlenecks, Gitau revealed they have burned the midnight oil to ensure a seamless event this time round.
"We have done several things. For the start point, we have separated the elite runners from the rest. We will have a gap between them and that is why we need to be very thorough in qualifying someone as an elite runner. We took a lot of input from the participants last year and that is why we have staggered the start times for the races," he explained.
Gitau added: "We have learnt a lot from the finish line. Several things are informing our decisions this time round. The area around the finish line will not have people moving around it. We will make sure it is restricted and the area beyond the finish line will have a designated place for all media so they have clean shots of the finish line. We will also make sure we don't have the challenge of multiple finish points."
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He was speaking on Thursday during after a breakfast meeting with several partners and sponsors ahead of the marathon on October 29 along the Southern By-pass route.
The meeting was also an opportunity to receive various sponsorships, which amounted to Ksh 178 million.
Gitau expressed his delight at the growing number of corporates who are coming on board to support the race.
"Beyond the transformative impact of our marathon for athletes, we are delighted to be partnering with our sponsors who use our marathon as vehicle to promote greater economic inclusion, especially for disadvantaged young people, as all proceeds from the marathon are dedicated to Standard Chartered Kenya's 'Future Makers' initiative," he said.
The road race is expected to attract tens of thousands of participants who will be competing in different categories, including 42km, 21km, 10km and the 5km family run, as well as similar competitions for persons living with disabilities.
