Uganda Wildlife Authority Jacob Kiplimo sets record
Uganda Wildlife Authority long distance teenage sensation, Jacob Kiplimo, bagged the Gold medal at the 2020 World Athletics Half Marathon in Gdynia, Poland, this past week on October 17, 2020.
The 19-year-old Kiplimo surged away from Kenya’s Kibiwott Kandie one mile from the finish line to win gold in a new championship record of 58:49.
The first to congratulate Kiplimo was Uganda’s President, His Excellency Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, who tweeted: “Congratulations to you, Jacob Kiplimo, on winning Gold for Uganda at the World Half Marathon championship. I also congratulate Joshua Cheptegei and the rest of the team; the Ugandan Flag has been raised so high.”
The two were slated for a showdown after Cheptegei had broken the world 5000-meter record last month in Monaco clocking 12:35.36, while Kiplimo won the 5000-meter in Ostrava in a 12:48.63 personal best and then clocked a world-leading 3000-meter personal best of 7:26.64 in Rome.
Uganda Wildlife Authority posted on facebook: “Congratulations to our staff, Jacob Kiplimo, on winning Gold for Uganda at the World Half Marathon championship. Jacob Kiplimo becomes the youngest ever Men’s World Half Marathon Champion! The Ugandan has set the World Athletics Under 20s Half Marathon World Best of 58:49 as well as the Championship Half Marathon Record!”
On October 11, compatriot and another Uganda Wildlife Authority’s long-distance runner, Sarah Chelangat, finished in the third position during the 10,000-meter Hengelo meeting that took place in the Netherlands.
At the 2016 Summer Olympics, Kiplimo became the youngest athlete to represent his country at the age of 15. Kiplimo turns 20 on November 14, 2020.
He hails from the Nilotic Sabiny tribe associated with the dying vice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) on the slopes of the 4321-metre Mt. Elgon in Eastern Uganda that speak Kupsabiny and Kalenjin dialect spoken by their Kenyan relations which has produced several long-distance greats over the years.
This explains and underscores the country’s entry into the club of the great long-distance nations at par with Kenya and Ethiopia.
