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Kenya Prisons recruit new blood to replace ageing sportsmen

Xinhua, May 21, 2015 Adjust font size:

Kenya Prisons Service, which for many years has been the country's premier sporting organization, has recruited new sportsmen and women to replace the ageing ones.

Prisons has brought on board over 150 sports persons, among them 16 world beating athletes, to beef up the organization's sporting prowess.

Consenslus Kipruto, the 3,000m steeplechase maestro and 800m Olympian and Anthony Chemut (10,000m) will spearhead the new onslaught at Prisons.

"We have in the past experienced a fall in sporting standards and the new recruits will hopefully open a new page for us," Benjamin Njoga, Senior Deputy Commissioner with Kenya Prisons Service, told Xinhua in Nairobi on Thursday.

The recruitment, which was conducted in Nairobi prisons, was the first ever in Kenya' s disciplined forces to be conducted for sports persons alone.

Players were selected from across 12 sports disciplines, with athletics taking the lion' s share of 25 athletes in majorly middle distance races and sprints. Other disciplines are football, netball, volleyball, Karate, Judo, boxing, wrestling, taekwondo, darts and body building.

Kenya Prisons Service has produced and nurtured several world beaters and has been a feeder to the country's national teams in various disciplines.

Miriam Muthoni and Vicilin Jepkesio were enlisted to fit into the shoes of former world marathon champion Catherine Ndereba and Edith Masai in the 10,000m respectively. Penina Wangare will spearhead prisons campaigns in the 3,000m steeple chase.

Ben Jipcho, who set a world record in the 3,000m steeplechase in 1973, Robert Ouko and the late Julius Sang, who were in the 4x400m quartet that won a gold medal for Kenya at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games, are some of the notable names from Kenya Prisons.

Others include Kenya's national team sprints coach, Stephen Mwaniki; London Olympics 5,000m bronze medalist Thomas Longosiwa; Delhi Commonwealth Games 1,500m champion Silas Kiplagat; the 2011 Diamond League 1,500m series winner, Nixon Chepseba; and 2007 World Youth 1,500m winner Fredrick Musyoki. Endite