Kenyan coach Mike Kosgei has confidence in his men's 12-km team for this weekend's world cross country championships despite the absence of five-time champion Paul Tergat. "I want to assure Kenyans that we'll perform well in Dublin. We've exhausted our training. In academic parlance, we've completed our syllabus. We are just doing revision now," Kosgei said.
Kosgei has a strong senior men's team that includes world 10,000 metres champion Charles Kamathi, who stopped Ethiopia's Haile Gebrselassie from winning a fifth straight world title in Edmonton last year and won a bronze medal at last year's world cross country championships in Ostend, Belgium.
Also in the team is world 5,000 metres champion Richard Limo, who is currently ranked number one for 5000 and 10,000 metres in the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) world rankings. Tergat, winner of the world title between 1995 and 1999, has turned to road racing and marathon and is preparing for next month's London Marathon.
Limo, who won the men's long course race at the Kenyan championships on February 23, is perceived as Kenya's new kid on the block. "We don't have a Tergat in the team but it is the first time that we have two world champions in the senior men's team and I can't be more confident," he said.
Filed by Sinéad Kissane
