Nairobi News

Sports

IAAF forced to backpedal after wrongly awarding Kenya’s gold medal to Ethiopian runner


The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) was on Saturday forced to award a gold medal to a Kenyan runner whom they had said had emerged third.

The drama happened in the women’s U20 race IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Denmark.

At first, IAAF had said the race was won by Ethiopia’s Alemitu Tariku followed by her compatriot Tsigie Gebreselama and Kenya’s Beatrice Chebet in that order.

“WOW. An amazing finish to the women’s U20 race. It’s Ethiopia 1-2, with Kenya in third in a photo finish,” read the tweet.

The tweet was accompanied by a picture showing the Kenyan runner clearly cutting the tape ahead of the two.

But after being questioned on the validity of the results, IAAF took down the post before updating that the Kenyan had won.

The association did not explain the mix up.