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Kenyan Charles Kipsang died during shortly after finishing the Cameroon Mountain Race of Hope on Saturday, February 24.

While leading the race, Kipsang suffered a heart attack, he experienced a late race fade and finished sixth. Efforts to revive him at the stadium were unsuccessful.

He started showing signs of discomfort in the latter stages of the race. However, he declined to let paramedics check him over.

“He developed a malaise and stopped during the race for some time. He was asked to get into the ambulance but he took some soda and continued to race,” explained South West Regional Governor Bernard Okalia Bilai.

The 33-year-old owns a modest marathon personal best of 2:25:39 which he set in Jakarta in 2018.

Kenyans were already mourning the recent losts of two other athletes.

Henry Rono

Kenyans are already mourning the loss of the legendary Henry Rono, who set a number of world records on the track. The peak of Rono’s running career was during the 1978 season. In a span of only 81 days, he broke four world records in the 10,000-metre (27:22.5), the 5000m (13:08.4), the 3000m steeplechase (8:05.4), and the 3000m (7:32.1).

Kelvin Kiptum

Kelvin Kiptum was just 23-years-old when he died in a single-vehicle accident. He ran won three of three marathons in a 10-month period including his debut in Valencia in December 2022 going 2:01:58. Four months later he won the London Marathon in 2:01:25. Then in October he broke Eliud Kipchoge’s world record of 2:01:09 with a performance of 2:00:35 in Chicago in October.

Kiptum was planning to run the Rotterdam marathon at the end of April and was hoping to become the first athlete to run under two hours.

Following Rotterdam, he was expecting to go head to head against Eliud Kipchoge at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.

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