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Moses Kiptanui continued his domination of the 3000m steeplechase in
1994, clocking the three fastest times recorded during that year,
comprising 8min 08.80sec at Zurich, 8min 09.16sec at Stockholm, and
another time of 8min 09.16sec at Berlin. He easily won this event at
the World Cup in London on 10 September in a rather pedestrian time, by
his standards, of 8min 28.28sec. Kiptanui had a phenomenal year in
1995, which he started by lowering the 3000m world indoor record to 7min
35.15sec at Gent on 12 February. In the outdoor season, he broke the
5000m world record at the Golden Gala meet in Rome on 8 June, setting a
new time of 12min 55.30sec.
However, even this outstanding performance
was outweighed by his deeds in the steeplechase during 1995. He set the
five fastest times of the year, all of which were faster than any other
steeplechaser had ever run in the history of the event. He won at the
Bislett Games in Oslo on 21 July in 8min 03.36sec, and then at
Gothenburg on 11 August, having effortlessly qualified for the final two
days earlier (see photo above), he led from start to finish to
easily win his third successive World Championships title in 8min
04.6sec. Five days later at Zurich on 16 August, he became the first
man to break 8 minutes for the 3000m steeplechase, leading all the way
to smash his world record with a time of 7min 59.18sec.
He followed
this nine days later with a second sub-8 minute clocking, when winning
at Brussels in 7min 59.52sec. Kiptanui also produced two superb
performances over 3000m, 7min 27.18sec at Monaco on 25 July, and 7min
28.04sec at Cologne on 18 August, which were respectively the second and
fourth fastest times in history at this distance. (Ron Casey)
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