BY STANLEY MAGUT
AFTER winning the women’s marathon title at the Commonwealth Games last Sunday in Glasgow, Flomena Cheyech has now turned her focus on the 2016 Rio Olympics.
“My next stop is the Olympic Games in Rio in 2016 and I want to realise my dream of winning gold,” said the West Pokot-born star. “This was my first major feat for Kenya and I am happy I opened the medals’ haul for the country,” Cheyech added. Cheyech was speaking during a homecoming party hosted to celebrate her victory at her home at Naiberi in Eldoret.
Cheyech, 32, made her international debut for Kenya in the 1999 IAAF World Cross Country Championships as junior, where she was placed 10th. She also featured in the 2009 World Half Marathon for Kenyan and was placed seventh. “I want to relax for some time before emarking on the next move. When I start my training, it will be geared towards Rio Olympics. Of course I would love to be at the World Championships in Beijing next year although my main intention is Olympics,” she revealed.
She revealed that she had initially wanted to cancel her travel due to visa hitch but her husband Willy Kimutai encouraged her to soldier on.
“My visa arrangement delayed and I had to struggle on my own to secure it. My husband really encouraged me not to lose hope and this was part of my inspiration to go for gold,” she said.
“I was not even sure of winning it since I had just won April’s Paris Marathon last April and I was still on my recovery process,” she noted.
Her husband Kimutai, who is the 2012 Rio Marathon winner and has been training with her said, “I knew she would make it and that’s why I told her not to give up. She heeded it and I am happy.”
Courtesy of the-star.co.ke