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Moses Kiptanui made an impressive debut in international athletics
winning the 1500m at the 1990 World Junior Championships in Plovdiv,
Bulgaria, in a time of 3min 38.32sec. His best 1500m time that year was
3min 36.73sec, which he achieved at Roverto, Italy on 21 August.
Kiptanui then began to concentrate on the 3000m steeplechase although he
continued to produce outstanding performances in other distance events
throughout his whole career. His performances in the steeplechase
during 1991 were nothing short of sensational, comprising eight wins and
two second place finishes from ten starts. He started the year by
winning the Kenyan Inter-Services title in a time of 8min 31.0sec and
he then recorded 8min 24.3sec in winning the Kenyan national
championship.
In his first steeplechase start in Europe, Kiptanui won
in Stockholm on 3 July in a time of 8min 07.89sec, which leapfrogged him
to 6th on the all-time world list. Following two more fast times set
in Rome and Zurich, Kiptanui travelled to Tokyo where, on 31 August, he
easily won the 1991 World Championships title in a time of 8min
12.59sec. Two weeks later, at the Van Damme memorial meeting in
Brussels, Kiptanui improved his personal best again, winning in a time
of 8min 06.46sec, the best time of the year, and only a second slower
than the world record. His last race in the European season was at the
Grand Prix final in Barcelona on 20 September. Although Kiptanui (see photo above)
ran an extremely fast time of 8min 13.92sec, he finished second to
Moroccan Abdelaziz Sahere, beaten by the narrow margin of only 0.09sec.
Kiptanui also improved his personal best in the 1500m during 1991,
recording a time of 3min 35.40sec at Monaco on 3 August. (Ron Casey)
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