Following the national World Athletics Under-20 Championship pre-trials held at Nyayo Stadium over the weekend, Athletics Kenya have identified close to 80 athletes who will be sent to different training camps across the country.
AK Youth Development Committee Barnaba Korir said: "We are exploring whether it is possible that the athletes selected will be able to begin training in December across the different camps. Afterwards, we will select the final Team Kenya."
Kenya will host the World Athletics Under-20 championships between August 17 and 22 next year at the Moi Stadium, Kasarani after it was rescheduled from its initial date of July 7-12 this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
"We are surprised by the level of performances at the pre-trials considering that most athletes did not have sufficient time to train," said Korir.
"There is even one runner in 5,000m who posted a really fast time of 13:31.0. We have also seen some exciting prospects in the 800m and this gives us a lot of hope because we have not had much success in this category in recent times."
Korir added that AK will place greater emphasis on field events and sprints to ensure better fortunes in the future.
"We have prepared a specialised training camp in Nairobi for our field events and sprints athletes. If we can improve on our performance in this category, we can earn more medals. We are determined to cement our top spot from the 2018 Championships in Tampere, Finland."
He further thanked the Ministry of Sports for their willingness to support AK during the training period and even in the run-up to the trials.
"We have talked with the ministry and they have expressed willingness in supporting our athletes in every way possible, including financially," he said.
He reiterated that the federation still has some funds to cater for the training of the team.
