Deep Dive: Cases of Kenyans Deliberately Letting Chinese Athletes Win Dated Back to 2019

China
China’s He Jie wins the Beijing Half Marathon on April 14, 2024, ahead of Kenyans Willy Mnangat and Robert Keter, and Ethiopia’s Dejene Hailu Bikila.
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A deep investigation of the Beijing Half Marathon showed that a Chinese agent could have used Kenyan athletes to fix races since 2019. 

This was after similar videos emerged of different Kenyans deliberately faltering minutes to the finish line. 

A scrutiny of Kenyan athletes who have failed to win the Beijing Half Marathon despite dominating the race has shown that they are all represented by one agent based in Mainland China.

This investigation was informed after two Kenyans Willy Mnangat and Robert Keter deliberately allowed Chinese national He Jie to win the half marathon on Sunday, April 14.

Marathon
Beijing Half Marathon held on April 14, 2024.
Photo
Sanan Lomwong

In 2019, a similar incident happened where two Kenyan athletes Silas Kimeli Too and Daniel Kiprop appeared to let China’s Liu Hongliang win the race. 

In the now-under-scrutiny video, Too and Kiprop led the race from the start but a few kilometres to the finish line, they let Liu overtake them. 

While overtaking is not a crime in any racing event, what raised suspicion is that seconds after overtaking them, Liu put his right hand behind his back and made a sign with two fingers. 

Immediately after the signal, the two athletes maintained a constant distance between themselves and Liu ensuring the Chinese national won the half marathon with two seconds to spare.

This alleged race fixing made Liu win a gold medal after unsuccessfully trying for the same in 2018.

The claim that Kenyan athletes have been participating in the race as pacesetters has since been debunked as they did not identify themselves as so before and during the race. 

In the 2019 and 2024 incidents, all Kenyan athletes can be seen wearing race bibs as well as their clothes. 

Ideally, pace-setters are not allowed to wear race bibs and now Kenyan athletes are remarking they did not know why they were given the bibs.

Also, in all cases, the Kenyan athletes were declared as silver and bronze medalists which should not be accorded to pacesetters. 

This has led to a theory that the Chinese agent could be exploiting the ignorance of some Kenyan athletes and paying them a pacer fee while keeping the prize money.

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Beijing Half Marathon held on April 14, 2024.
Photo
Sanan Lomwong