WXC Belgrade 24 mixed relay preview: Past champions Kenya and Ethiopia clash
Since the mixed relay was introduced to the program in 2017, Kenya has won two titles and Ethiopia has secured one.
They will clash again at the World Athletics Cross Country
Championships Belgrade 24 on Saturday (30).
Kenya claimed the inaugural relay crown ahead of Ethiopia and Turkiye in Kampala seven years ago and then Ethiopia won from Morocco and Kenya in Aarhus in 2019.
Kenya regained
the title in Bathurst in 2023, denying Ethiopia and host nation Australia, and
now the Kenyan squad is ready to mount a strong title defence.
The event in Belgrade will involve teams of two women and two men each running one loop of the course in the order man-woman-man-woman.
The course loop is 1887m, but the first and
last legs will be around 200m longer. Athletes must carry a wristband that will
be transferred to the next athlete within the takeover zone.
Kenya and Ethiopia
are among the 12 teams entered, as they go for gold again in Friendship Park.
Three of the four winning team members from Bathurst are back on the Kenyan squad for Belgrade.
Emmanuel Wanyonyi won the world U20 800m title in 2021 and went on to finish fourth when making his senior debut at the World Athletics Championships in Oregon in 2022.
A year on from his mixed relay success in Australia, he now
heads to Serbia as the world 800m silver medallist, Diamond League champion and
Rising Star award winner, looking for another honour to add to his CV.
Mirriam Cherop ran the second leg in Bathurst while Kyumbe Munguti took on the third and they could both join Wanyonyi in Belgrade.
Kenya has named a six-strong squad to
select a team from and adding further quality are world U20 mile record-holder
Reynold Cheruiyot, who secured silver in the U20 men’s race in Bathurst last
year and won the 2022 world U20 1500m title, plus 2021 world U20 1500m champion
Purity Chepkirui and Virginia Nyambura.
The final composition
of teams must be declared 95 minutes before the race in Belgrade.
Ethiopia has also
named a six-strong squad, headed by world 5km champion Hagos Gebrhiwet. The
29-year-old won the world U20 cross country title in Bydgoszcz in 2013 and has
gone on to become an Olympic and two-time world 5000m medallist. Now he makes a
return to cross country running fresh from his African 5000m title win in Accra
last Friday.
Joining him in the
squad is Adehena Kasaye, who formed part of Ethiopia’s silver medal-winning
team in Bathurst, plus Birri Abera, Dahdi Dube, Hiwot Mehari and Taresa Tolosa.
Morocco, silver
medallists between Ethiopia and Kenya in 2019, fields a team featuring Kaoutar
Farkoussi who ran the second leg to help her nation to that runner-up finish in
Aarhus. She’s joined by Hicham Akankam, Bathurst team member Hafid Rizqy and
Rahma Tahiri.
USA finished fourth
in Aarhus and fifth in Bathurst. Back on the medal hunt, this time the quartet
includes Pan-American 5000m champion Kasey Knevelbaard, plus Ella Donaghu,
Katie Izzo and John Reniewicki.
Another athlete to
watch out for is Nozomi Tanaka, who is entered for her fourth global
championship in eight months. After finishing eighth in the 5000m at the World
Athletics Championships, eighth in the mile at the World Road Running
Championships and eighth in the 3000m at the World Indoor Championships, she
now returns to form part of Japan’s mixed relay team in Belgrade. Tanaka raced
at the World Cross Country Championships last year, too, finishing 14th in the
senior women’s race.
The host nation team includes multiple European medallist Elzan Bibic, Nikola Raicevic, Teodora Simovic and Milica Tomasevic.
Jess Whittington for World Athletics
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