Tariku Bekele of Ethiopia winning his 3000m heat (© Getty Images)
Reigning World junior 5000m bronze medallist Tariku Bekele and Ethiopian junior cross country champion Werkitu Ayanu are the star names in Ethiopia’s final squad of eleven athletes for the 11th IAAF World Junior Championships in Beijing, China (August 15-20 2006).
Two steeplechasers, a sprinter, and three middle distance runners were among those dropped from the team in the final wave of selections announced on Wednesday with the Ethiopian Athletics Federation (EAF) citing budgetary constraints for trimming the size of the squad to eleven from the initial nineteen.
Tariku Bekele: third time lucky?
Despite the omissions, the strength of Ethiopia’s squad remains intact with Tariku Bekele leading out a strong line-up in the distance events.
The 19-year-old, who is in his final junior year, hopes to go better than his bronze and silver medal winning performances in the 10th IAAF World Junior Championships in Grosseto, Italy and the 3rd IAAF World Youth Championships in Sherbrooke, Canada a year earlier.
T. Bekele will be buoyed by an encouraging season highlighted by a bronze medal winning performance at the 34th IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Fukuoka, Japan and an Ethiopian junior 5000m record of 12:53.81 at the Golden Gala (IAAF Golden League) meet in Rome.
Tariku, who is Kenenisa Bekele’s younger brother, will have a strong Kenyan contingent to give him sleepless nights before the 5000m final on 19 August, but he will be wary of another emerging talent from Ethiopia’s conveyor belt of distance running in the shape of Abraham Cherkose.
The 17-year-old is the reigning World Youth 3000m champion and has shown the kind of form that makes him a force to be reckoned with in Beijing this year. Apart from winning the high-profile Carlsbad 5000 road race in the US, Cherkose smashed World Youth records over the 3000m and 5000m in Lausanne and Rome.
In the men’s 10,000m, Ethiopian 10,000m champion Ibrahim Jeylan is the runner to watch out for after his improved performance in the European track circuit. Jeylan claimed victory over the same distance in Hengelo, a meet where victory is now regarded as an omen of greatness for Ethiopian athletes. Dereje Tadesse takes the place of Ethiopian 10,000m bronze medallist Tadesse Tola in the 10,000m after the latter was drafted into the squad for the African Championships.
African junior steeplechase silver medallist Nahom Mesfin hopes to end his junior tenure with a global medal, while Mekonnen Gebremedhin, 800m/1500m champion in the Addis Ababa Municipal Championships in April this year, lines up in the 800m.
Ayanu is coming good at the right time
Werkitu Ayanu has been hailed as one of Ethiopia’s most prolific junior for some time now with little more than a fourth place finish in the 2004 IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Brussels to show for it all.
But according to the Ethiopian Athletics Federation’s technical department head Re’eso Kedir, the 18-year-old is coming good at the right time. “Her form in training has improved dramatically in the last month,” he says. “We are expecting gold from her.”
Ayanu has put on some encouraging displays in this track season including a second place finish ahead of Ejegayehou Dibaba but behind Meseret Defar in the Ethiopian championships 5000m race. In the international track circuit, she placed second and registered an encouraging sub-15 minute clocking in Meseret Defar’s 5000m World record run in New York in June.
She will be joined in the 5000m in Beijing by another newcomer in Wude Ayalew. Ayalew surprised many by finishing fifth in the long race in Fukuoka and added a national 10km record in Freiburg, although the mark was later improved by Berhane Adere in the Great Manchester Run.
The EAF’s budgetary problems sees Belaynesh Zemedkun, fifth in the junior race in Fukuoka, as the country’s sole representative in the 3000m with both Koreni Jelila and Genzebe Dibaba (younger sister of Tirunesh Dibaba) out of reckoning for selection. Emebet Eta’a, second in the 2005 Confidence Women First 5km run in Addis Ababa, lines up in the 1500m.
Elshadai Negash for the IAAF
Ethiopian team
Men
800m: Mekonnen Gebremedhin (NA)
3000m SC: Nahom Mesfin (June 3 1989)
5000m: Abreham Cherkose (September 23 1989)
5000m: Tariku Bekele (February 28 1987)
10000m: Ibrahim Jeylan (June 12 1989)
10000m: Dereje Tadesse (June 12 1987)
Women
1500m: Embet Eta’a (January 11 1990)
3000m: Belaynesh Zemedkun (December 23 1987)
3000m SC: Mekdes Bekele (January 20 1987)
5000m: Wude Ayalew (July 4 1987)
5000m: Workitu Ayanu (April 19 1987)
Team Leader: Samson Baye
Head Coach: Alebachew Alemu
