He’s back. Ibrahim Jeilan, the 2011 world 10,000m champion, relived his former glory and sent a sizeable Ethiopian contingent into rapturous celebrations at the Bauhaus-Galan in Stockholm on Thursday evening (16), the eighth stop of the IAAF Diamond League.
World Championships medallists Ibrahim Jeilan and Almaz Ayana were among the high-profile winners at the Ethiopian Championships at the Addis Ababa stadium last week (10-15 June).
Ethiopia’s Ibrahim Jeilan, the 2011 IAAF World Championships 10,000m gold medallist and silver medallist over the same distance in Moscow, will attempt his first Half Marathon when he competes at the Rock’n’Roll Vodafone Half Marathon of Portugal in Lisbon on Sunday (6).
Just like at the IAAF World Championships in Daegu two years ago, the longest race on the track boiled down to a last-lap battle between Great Britain’s Mo Farah and Ethiopia’s Ibrahim Jeilan, but this time the roles were reversed.
Double London 2012 Olympic Games gold medallist Mo Farah may not have run over 25 laps of the track since his triumph on home soil last summer but there is no doubting that he remains the favourite to go one better than he did in Daegu two years ago and take the gold medal of the longest event on the track.
Kenenisa Bekele insisted ahead of Sunday’s SPAR Great Ireland Run, an IAAF Silver label Road Race that despite a disappointing two-year spell when his career was derailed for much of the time through injury, that he is targeting a medal this summer's IAAF World Championships.
Ethiopia’s 2011 World Championships 10000m gold medallist Ibrahim Jeilan continues his comeback after injuries in 2012 ruined his Olympic ambitions and he will compete in the SPAR Great Ireland Run, an IAAF Silver Label Road Race, in Dublin on 14 April.
The cloudy skies in Portugal threaten to rain at the EDP Lisbon Half Marathon, an IAAF Gold Label Road Race, on Sunday (24) but that won’t stop both races being highly competitive.
The Ethiopian Athletic Federation has designated the men's and women's 10,000m races at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, the fourth of the 2013 Samsung Diamond League meetings, as its country’s selection races for the 2013 IAAF World Championships in Moscow.
He's only 22 years-old, but to Ethiopia's Ibrahim Jeilan his gold medal in last night's 10,000m was a long time coming.