I've always seen Kenyans and Ethiopians performing extremely well in marathons and I've always wondered what could be the factor behind their dominance in the world of marathon.
In every international marathon tournament, the chances of a Kenyan emerging the winner is so damn high. In fact, each time I see a Kenyan participating in a marathon I see him as a big threat in the race. Although, Kenyans may not perform well in football, volleyball, boxing, cricket, baseball etc but when it comes to marathon let's give it up to them.
Kenyans marathon runners both male and female are always a little bit faster than the rest of the world in marathon races. Even at the finish life, you could see Kenyans emerging 1st, 2nd and 3rd.
So what do Kenyans perform so well and dominate the world of marathons?
This is a fascinating question you might want to know the answer, and I know you may be wondering if I have a definite answer to why Kenyans person perform extremely well in marathons. Well, the answer is No.. So everybody just guess
I believe it's quite illogical to qualify all of the factors that make a marathon runner better than others because everything boils down to fitness level, strength, diet and other factors, but I'm going to mention some factors which I think make Kenyans better marathon runners
Kenyans seems to be natural runners due to a combination number of factors such as upbringing, environment and training. According to my little research, I discovered that the region that produces best marathon runners from Kenya is the West Rift Valley. It's a place where many poor people live. There are almost no jobs except subsistence. There are no access to vehicles, electricity and good roads
Most people in that region don't even own a car which means there are really few options for young people to live comfortable and convenient lives. Kids are not taken to school with cars, so they will have to run to school with bare foot no matter how far it can be. In civilized countries where things work well, children have access to almost everything to make life comfortable and convenient for them but reverse is the case in many countries in Africa where poverty level is high.
As a result of the hardship and the stress they go through in their everyday lives, this has some effects in making their body withstand stress and long suffering and that's why they end up being excellent and incredible marathon runners. The perform well than other runners probably because they are already use to trekking their lives out.
I don't know if this post makes sense to someone and if it does, I hope you learnt something today?
Thank you for reading and have a nice day