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Winfred Mutile Yavi has detailed what she wants to take away from her country of birth next after locking out Kenyans from Olympics and World Championship gold in the last one year.
World and Olympics 3,000m steeplechase champion Winfred Mutile Yavi now wants to lower the world record currently held by Kenya’s Beatrice Chepkoech.
The Kenyan-born Bahraini has proved to be a thorn in the flesh for athletes from her country of birth, beating Chepkoech to World Championship gold in 2023, before she stormed to Olympics gold in Paris this month.
Yavi summoned enough strength to floor defending champion Peruth Chemutai in Paris to win gold in an Olympics record time of 8:52.76 as the Ugandan settled for silver in 8:53.34 with Kenya’s Faith Cherotich clinching bronze in 8:55.15.
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07:56 - 19.08.2024
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Chepkoech could only manage sixth place after looking like she could be in the medal positions only to fade off at the final stretch.
“My goal was only Olympics this year. My team supported me and I have always worked together with my coach and Bahrain federation and everybody and fans. They believed in me and the faith pushes me to keep winning,” Yavi told Gulf Daily News, while revealing how she managed to stun Chemutai for gold.
“I was like, let me just wake up because I thought she [Chemutai] was moving too fast and it was all about my mental strength. I was like I can do this and just executed what I had in the body and found myself at the finishing line,” she added.
“I didn’t know the time was too fast, I was surprised because my target was going there and making a move, study the race and secure first place so it was just a surprise to me.”
Having handed Chepkoech back-to-back defeats at major championships, Yavi now wants to go for another of the 2019 world champion’s treasured possessions, the world record.
Chepkoech has held the world record since July 2018 when she set a new mark of 8:44.32 at the Monaco Diamond League, lowering the time of 8:52.78, set by another Kenyan-born-Bahraini Ruth Jebet in 2016.
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“It is always good to break a record and that is also my target,” added the Makueni-born runner. “I will be graduating from event to event but next year, I will still do my steeplechase and 5,000m because we still have the Asian Games and I will keep on trusting the process.”
The 24-year-old was born in Makueni but moved to Bahrain when she was 15, becoming eligible to represent the Middle East nation in 2016 and made her debut at the 2017 World Championships where she managed eighth place in the 3,000m steeplechase.
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