John Kelai - A Story on Resilience (Part 3B)

John Ekiru Kelai - From a developmental runner to a world beater

Commonwealth Games Marathon 2010

John Ekiru Kelai, born in 29th December, 1976, is a male long-distance runner from Kenya, who focuses on marathon race . He has a personal best of 2hr 09min 09sec when he ran in the men's marathon race in the 2005 edition of the Eindhoven Marathon. He came in forth in the race. He is a two-time winner of the Enschede Marathon and had consecutive wins at the Mumbai Marathon in 2007–2008. Other achievements on the road include his winning of the Singapore Marathon in 2003, the 2004 Brussels Marathon, and was the 2007 winner of the Toronto Waterfront Marathon.

However, in the 2009 season he was third at the Mumbai Marathon, failing to defend his title, and took fourth in the Singapore Marathon. Nevertheless, over time, he bounced back when he got selected for the marathon at the 2010 Commonwealth Games. After 1hr and 36mon 03sec of push coming from Samson Ramadhani from Tanzania, the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games Champion, John Kelai took the lead at 1hr 50min onwards to gradually pulled himself away from the field of lead runners. He was relentless in increasing the gap and finally finish as the Commonwealth champion for the marathon race. He is currently the second Kenyan to win the title after Douglas Wakiihuri for the men's race. 

After the race, John commented, "I am so humbled to win here. It is an honour. I didn't know I could be the winner", said an ecstatic Kelai, "I feel on top of the world. This is for my country, the people, coaches and officials. All of us are going to celebrate when you can win at the level you have reached your peak," he said.