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Ismael Kirui had an excellent pedigree for a top distance and
cross-country runner. He was the younger brother of Richard Chelimo,
who set a 10000m world record in 1993, and their sister, Catherine
Kirui, placed 11th in the 1995 World Cross-Country Championships. Kirui
first came to notice at the 1990 World Junior Championships in Plovdiv,
where, at the tender age of 15, he came second in the 10000m behind his
brother Richard Chelimo. As a 17 year-old at the next World Junior
Championships, at Seoul in 1992, he was narrowly beaten by Ethiopian
Haile Gebrselassie in the 5000m, reversing their finishing order at the
World Cross-Country Championships held earlier that year in Boston,
where Kirui had claimed the junior title, finishing over eight seconds
ahead of Gebrselassie. Although still a junior, Kirui had a magnificent
year in 1993 competing in senior competition.
On 28 March, at
Amorebieta, Spain, he finished third in the World Cross-Country
Championships, but still earned enough points to win the IAAF World
Cross Challenge based on results in a series of races in the 1992/93
year. On 7 July, at Lausanne, he bettered his brother's world junior
record for 5000m with a time of 13min 06.71sec. Tragically, this
performance was not ratified as a new record because the officials had
failed to arrange a doping test. However, Kirui officially claimed the
world junior record the next month at the Weltklasse meet at Zurich,
setting a new time of 13min 06.50sec. This was just a prelude to his
performance twelve days later at the World Championships in Stuttgart.
In the 5000m final, on 16 August, Kirui won the gold medal from
Gebrselassie (see photo above) in another world junior record of
13min 02.75sec. At 18 years 177 days, Kirui became the youngest ever
male world champion in any event. (Ron Casey)
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