Ethiopia’s Letesenbet Gidey eyes gold medal at the WXC Bathurst 23

Addis Ababa, February 15, 2023 (FBC) – Ethiopian Athlete, Letesenbet Gidey, is ready to conquer the World Athletics Cross Country Championships Bathurst 23, as she sets sights on gold medal.

Had the World Athletics Cross Country Championships Bathurst 23 gone ahead in 2021 as originally planned, there’s a strong chance that Letesenbet Gidey would already be a world champion at the discipline.

The Ethiopian was in sensational form in 2020 and 2021, setting world records of 14:06.62 for 5000m and 29:01.03 for 10,000m. She had to settle for bronze at the Olympic Games at the longer event, but she prioritised global honours over records in 2022 and was rewarded with her first world title on the track, winning the 10,000m in Oregon in a nail-biting race, according to the World Athletics.

The 24-year-old is now focused on winning her first individual senior world cross-country title. She won back-to-back U20 crowns in 2015 and 2017, joining an elite club of athletes to achieve the feat, alongside Faith Kipyegon and Genzebe Dibaba.

Letesenbet finished third in the senior women’s race in 2019 and earned gold in the team competition, but this time she heads to Bathurst as one of the big favourites.

If her performance at the Jan Meda Cross Country – Ethiopia’s trial event for the World Cross – is anything to go by, Letesenbet is certainly in form to challenge for gold in Bathurst. In that race back on 1 January, she bided her time until the last kilometre of the race and then soon opened up a gap of about 20 seconds on a strong domestic field.

As much as individual glory will be Letesenbet’s biggest goal on Saturday, she will also want to earn gold in the team standings, and Ethiopia will once again be in with a great shout of doing exactly that.

Gete Alemayehu, who has a 1:06:37 half marathon PB, was second in the trial race, just ahead of 30:06.01 10,000m performer Tsigie Gebreselama, bronze medallist in the U20 race in Aarhus in 2019. Fellow Ethiopian Fotyen Tesfaye just missed out on a top-10 placing in Aarhus, so will be keen to improve on that in Bathurst.

But Letesenbet and her Ethiopian compatriots won’t have an easy ride, as they’ll be up against someone who is undefeated in international cross-country races for more than a year.

Eritrea’s Rahel Daniel has dominated the World Athletics Cross Country Tour and currently tops the season standings thanks to her three victories last month. She won at the prestigious Campaccio meeting in San Giorgio su Legnano, then two days later triumphed in Elgoibar, winning by eight seconds. More recently she won in Hannut, racing in heavy snow, showing she can cope well in any conditions, as per the World Athletics.

At the beginning of the event, tributes were paid to the victims of catastrophic earthquake in Turkiye and Syria.

By Yonathan Yoseph