The amazing journey of Kenya’s world champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi

Whenever people saw Emmanuel Wanyonyi running around his village in Saboti, West of Kenya, they would mock and ridicule him.

‘This guy has gone crazy,’ he remembers hearing people making fun of him as he jogged around his village.

The jeering made him go even faster, and sometimes the teenage boy would share with the naysayers his dream of becoming a world-famous runner.

“When I told them this, they told me I was wasting my time as no one from my tribe runs,” he recalled in an interview with Olympics.com.

Still, he kept on, fuelled by his desire to become a great runner and lift his family from misery.

He grew up surrounded by poverty and hardship, his parents struggled to educate him and his 10 siblings. But Wanyonyi was lucky to pursue an education on the promise of his athletic talent.

“I knew from way back that the only thing that could save me and my family from this difficult life was running…that’s why I just focussed all my energies on training.”

He rose to become the latest in a long line of Kenyan runners to rule the 800m.

The world U20 800m champion capped his season with silver from the 2023 World Championships and the Diamond League Trophy. All this and his only just 19.

And for the second year in a row, the prodigy has been nominated for the** World Athletics Rising Star awards**. The winners will be announced on 11 December.

A running opportunity, an escape

It’s hard to imagine that Kenya’s current top 800m runner almost didn’t become a runner at all.

Growing up in a large family in his hometown in Tran Nzoia County, situated northwest of the capital Nairobi, life was a struggle.

His family barely had enough to get by. By the age of 10, little Wanyonyi was forced to drop out of school, and like many boys in the remote parts of Saboti, some as young as six years, he sought work as a herd boy.

He looked after cattle as a means of survival for years, and during his free time, he would go running around a track at a local school. A teacher spotted his talent and supported his return to school.

Haunted by his difficult upbringing and the trauma of poverty, Wanyonyi trained harder and ran even faster.

He always made the podium across the track disciplines from the 400m event up to the 5,000m, at the county and national county levels.

“When I started, I ran 5,000m and then 3,000m and even steeplechase as I was just trying out everything. I even did 8km in the cross-country,” he told Olympics.com in Budapest, where he won silver.

His life changed again in 2018 when his father died. Wanyonyi’s mother left with his younger siblings, while he was sent to live with an aunt who also had very little. He knew he had to step up and support his family in some way.

“I didn’t come from a family of runners, but I knew that I could make it as a runner if I trained and pushed hard. I had to do it for my family,” said the rising talent, as the memory brought back glimpses of the dark place they were in.

He was carrying a lot of baggage.

“I am the fifth born of 11 children, and most of them never went to school. As the only one who was in school, and I saw running as an opportunity out of our misery.”

From the cattle fields to the tracks

Luckily, his ascent on the track advanced even further in high school.

“I was so committed to the running cause. I would leave school and go to training in my uniform or just my normal home clothes because that’s all I had. I didn’t even have training shoes. I would make sure I clock my 5 to 7km, morning and evening,” he said of what also became his escape.

“I would go to bed sometimes quite late as I had to finish my assignments, but still wake up at 4 or 5am to train before going to class. I was often caned for reporting to class late because I had to train first. I was worried that if I fell back in training and running, I would lose the opportunity to study and the education scholarship.”

His school was situated in Nandi County, a high-altitude cradle hub of Kenya running. That’s where he met the 2007 world champion Janeth Jepkosgei, who had also just begun to focus on training young talents.

“Janeth has done a lot for me. She is the one who encouraged me to keep going forward and continue to put in the work in training. She gave me my first training programme, advised me to focus on running 800m, then linked me up with Claudio [Berardelli], her former coach.”

Having the backing of a world champion emboldened him and drowned out the noise that could have distracted him from his goals.

Most Kenyan runners, come from the Kalenjin tribe, an ethnic group believed to have physical and genetic traits that make them better endurance runners. Wanyonyi is a Luhya, believed to have the characteristics and muscle power to sprint.

“There were people who mocked me when I started running, while others would laugh in my face. There were others who called me mad when they saw me running around training. They told me no one from my tribe runs,” he shared of how most locals believed his physical trait would inform his athletic success.

“A lot of people still ask me, 'how come you are a Luhya, and you can run so well?' I keep telling them that anyone can be good at anything they want to be, if you put their mind to it. Nothing is impossible.

“Look at how races are evolving globally…running is no longer just for Kalenjin’s or just Kenyans, we have the Norwegians winning, Americans running even faster in the middle distance…”

The turning point for Wanyonyi

Wanyonyi banished any doubts over his abilities during an extraordinary international debut at the 2021 World U20 Championships.

His astonishing 1:43:76 run in the final in Nairobi was way faster than compatriot Emmanuel Korir’s 1:45:06 winning time in the Tokyo Olympics final.

“I never imagined I would be competing at the world level at that early stage of my running career. I’d just started running nationally that year. I came from nowhere to win,” said Wanyonyi of the moment that forced his cynics to have a rethink.

“I always had the drive to be a better runner. And more importantly, it was all about staying true to the cause – my family. I am always pushing hard to make sure my siblings will have more opportunities than I had growing up.”

The junior championships changed Wanyonyi’s life. At 19, he looks and sounds mature having assumed the parental role of his family.

“After running the World U20, I went and looked for my mum, got her a piece of land and built her a home where she now lives with my younger siblings. Also, considering most of my siblings didn’t go to school, I focussed on ensuring the younger ones got an education. They are worth every pain and suffering from my training.”

In 2022, his first year as a senior, he showed up strong making the podium of each of his national and international 800m races and just missed out on a medal at the World Championships in Eugene finishing fourth behind compatriot Korir.

He began this year in earnest. The fifth fastest U20 runner in the world was part of Kenya’s gold-medal-winning team at the World Cross Country Championships in February. He followed that up with silver at the worlds in Budapest and also won four Diamond League races, including the final in Eugene, where he upset reigning world 800m champion Marco Arop.

“I never dreamt or imagined that I would be competing at this level. Never! That my name would be mentioned in the same breath with some of the great champions I used to watch on TV,” he bared, impressed with his track progress.

“I am no longer just the village boy, I am now a known runner and other boys back at home look up to me. A lot of them have started training after seeing my success.”

The next goal on his horizon is the Paris Olympics.

“Now that I have learnt how to run with the seniors, I want to train hard for the Olympics. Never mind that I only learnt of the existence of the Olympics when I was competing at the World U20, that’s when I saw Emmanuel Korir running and winning. He timed 1:45, and I did 1:43 and that’s when I also got the courage to move up to the senior level.

"I now have high hopes and big dreams for Emmanuel Wanyonyi."