Chepkoech, Kuria shift eyes on 1,500m glory but Semenya stands-in-between

Chepkoech, Kuria shift eyes on 1,500m glory but Semenya stands-in-between

After relinquishing the men 5,000m and women 10,000m titles to Uganda at the ongoing Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia, Beatrice Chepkoech and Mary Kuria will chase the 1,500m glory on Thursday.

The duo successfully secured the tickets to the women’s final after the Monday heats.

Chepkoech who is using the race for flat speed ahead of next year’s World Championships in Doha, Qatar, clocked four minutes, 08.29 seconds as Kuria set a season best of 4:06.58 in the first year.

Winny Chebet will be forced to watch the final from the terraces after being tripped in the second heat. She picked herself up and jogged to the finish line to clock 4:20.67.

Their biggest headache will be two-time Olympic and three-time 800m World champion Caster Semenya of South Africa who is in the hunt for her first global title in the 1,500m.

Semenya is hungry for another title after winning a bronze medal in 4:02.90 during last year’s World Championships in London.

Early Thursday, Beijing World champion Nicholas Bett will be in pursuit of another global title in the 400m hurdles alongside his twin brother, an African bronze medalist in the same event, Aaron Koech. Koech will be looking forward to upstaging his brother at the main stage in search of the coveted title.

William Mbevi will also try his luck to qualify for the semi finals.

Apart from athletics, Kenya will be seeking to put a formidable performance it the table tennis singles. Brian Mutua and Sejall Thakkar will be looking forward to posting better results having used the ITTF Africa Continental Cup Top 16 on March 1-3 in Nairobi as a test match ahead of the international assignment.

Brian Mutua of Kenya returns a serve from Idowu Saheed of Congo during the ITTF Africa Cup match at the Kasarani stadium Indoor Arena on March 01, 2018. (PHOTO/Stafford Ondego/Sportpicha.com)

The badminton and squash preliminaries start on Tuesday as they seek to bring a first medal in each of the disciplines.

Tags:

Caster Semenya Australia Beatrice Chepkoech Commonwealth Games Gold Coast Mary Kuria 500m title chase for 1

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