Sotokoto 6 with ones and firsts
One am
I slept at one AM on July 3, 2016 – same day of the big run. Thank Germany for this. I had bet on them winning the quarter final match against Italy at the ongoing UEFA European Champions Football tournament in France. I was confident of sleeping by 11.30pm when they scored their first goal in the second half for the match that started at 10.00pm. However, it was not to be. The game ended 1-1 by 90 minutes. Extra time was a must, and no more goals were scored in the additional 30 minutes.
I was therefore awake past mid-night to witness the penalty shootouts. I have been ‘listening’ to the penalties in the last month, but I discovered that a local free to air channel was showing the matches and had my opportunity to watch the shoot-outs. And who would have expected that both teams can squander three penalties a piece at the initial five kicks each? The match was therefore won on the 9th kick of the extra five kicks. I hope ‘the machine’ does not keep me waiting this long as they advance to the semis. (Read a previous blog story where I lost a bet on some matches leading to this quarter finals stage. I was therefore a bit passionate about my bets at this point. So far all but one had come true. The single miss being the Portugal-Poland tie, where the penalty shoot out let down my Poland bet)
Kumi na moja
That is the time was that I was taking breakfast, ready to leave the house for the bus stage. I was at the Nakuru highway at 5.20am and got into a matatu ten minutes later. I landed at the city centre at six and walked to Haile Sellasie – Uhuru Highway junction to await a vehicle. This next vehicle took me past Nyayo stadium to the diversion at T-Mall, where the left side of the road was already closed and had to share the wrong side of the road with oncoming traffic. I walked from Wilson Airport to Uhuru gardens – a ten minute walk – to warm me up ready for the run.
One toilet
The athletes had already started gathering at Uhuru gardens by the time I arrived at the gardens compound about seven. It is usual to empty the body ready for such a run, and that is what forced me to the usual directions of the washrooms. I was glad to see the single toilet block, though I wondered why they did not think of portable ones or any other way of coping with the expected numbers. Woe to me, when I reached the block to find it locked.
“Wapi choo?,” a colleague in front of me asked the stranger standing around. He could have been an official of Sotokoto or a cop or just someone in some uniform.
“Eh!... Imefungwa?,” he asked and answered himself, “Sijui”
A lady who was just ahead kind of pressed her mid-part with his hands, tried to walk aimlessly, but could not hold it any longer. She just crouched and let go. The two gents, and those behind us, now at an abrupt stop, just out of a locked block, decided to look elsewhere. Luckily, there was a ticket on the fringes of the gardens. The guys just watered the thicket. Those with ‘heavier’ ideas fertilized the thickets, just almost in plain sight.
Saa moja
“Ni saa moja,” someone announced on the public address system, “Twakata kuanza mbio. Wote waende kwa barabara nje ya compound hii.”
For the benefit of the foreigners, evidently Japanese, who were the main sponsored, she translated, “We are about to start the run. All are asked to get out of this compound to the main road.”
Soon a crowd gathered outside Uhuru gardens, on the tarmac road now closed to traffic, next to some two signs of both of the road, written “START”
First Lady
We got to learn that the run shall be flagged off by the first lady of the republic, Mrs. UK. Time started running and no sight of our host. Runners just milled around, some in chatter, others in thought. Some took selfies, others watched them take them. Some warmed up, others stayed put. Some complained loudly of the delay, others were indifferent.
Three outrider motorbikes followed by three dark Mercedes Benz saloons signaled the arrival of the guest. A fourth big van, same dark colour, followed at the rear. As usual, these machinery forcefully ejected the once settled runners out of the comfort of the tarmac and had to seek refuge on the road side for the 30-second duration of the drama.
One hundred
One hundred is the number of runners that I counted at the starting line. Is this not the worst publicized run in Nairobi? Raising only 100 runners out of a city of over 1 million!? Is this a joke or what? I wonder why the organizers cannot raise the numbers, when other runs are twice expensive in terms of registration fees and these usually marshal over five thousand runners.
This was the worst attended run ever. I was been to other three Sotokotos in the past, 2009, 2010 and 2013, but none was this bad. I tend to think that the organizers just woke up some day in mid-June and decided that they are holding the run. Contrast that to the Nairobi International marathon, for example, which is already registered runners for the October event, over 3 months in advance. And, this is just because it is local. Other international runs at the big arenas in the US and UK register runners almost one year to the event, and close half year before the run.
July 1
Looking back, I was at Uhuru gardens secretariat office of Sotokoto on Friday, July 1 to collect my run number and kit. This was after receiving official communication that the kits would be ready for all to collect from 9.00am on that Friday and the following day only. I was taken aback as to how they can issue the runner kits just 48-hours to the event, for all the runners that they were expecting? Had they deliberately orchestrated this run to fail or what? How many people can collect kits within 48-hours at such a remote location? It took me two hours on two public transport vehicles to get to these offices (plus a third broken down matatu and double the fare as a consequence).
“We do not have T-shirts yet,” the lady at the unmarked reception and the equally concealed secretariat office started when she saw my approach. The reason why I was able to trace this office location was due to precedence. I just recalled where I got it three years ago. Without that experience I could have been lost.
“What do you mean?,” was my answer. They had communicated to me that I should pick the gear, and here they were telling me that there was nothing. Could they not get their act together first before inconveniencing such philanthropic runners?
1pm
She tried to explain that the kits were late, though they had the run numbers only at the moment. She said something about suppliers, delays, expected after 1pm, come back later, or come back tomorrow.
“I come from Uthiru, which is in a different province” I told her, “I am not coming back here! Get me someone who shall give me a solution.”
She hesitated.
“Make no mistake,” I reiterated, “Am not coming back to Langata road until Sunday.”
There is nothing that breaks the toughest of situations that some simple words, which I encountered when finally some guy came into the office, “Apologies, we are very sorry that the T-Shirts are not available yet. Truly sorry. Accept our apologies.”
What say you, when someone apologizes over a situation? You are completely broken down and your defenses are no longer in place.
“Get me the run number. I shall use a previous T-Shirt,” I assisted them.
0011
Was I really runner no. 11? I registered for the event on June 15, having received an invitation through email the previous day. The registration fee was KShs.1,050 – a strange figure, but when I finally saw the receipt showing only 1,000/=, I understood that the organizers did not want to incur any processing charges through the PesaPal platform that was handling the online payments.
If it was true that I was the eleventh runner, based on the run number, then the registration for this event was worse than I thought. Add to the delay in providing runner kits in time and you have a situation at your hands.
One stanza
We sung one stanza of the national anthem just after her excellence arrived. Thereafter, it was a matter of the flag off though a countdown from 10. At count 1, the blast of a starter gun was heard and all started the run. I started my timer.
The run route had changed. I have run from the Nairobi National park to Nyayo stadium and back as was the inaugural run circuit or from Uhuru gardens to Nyayo stadium with two loops and back, as was my second run in Sotokoto two.
This third run on Sotokoto 6 was taking advantage of the newly build Southern by-pass that connects Langata road to Nakuru highway. It was a simple enough route – a run from Uhuru gardens, straight to the by-pass to head towards Ngong forest side upto the 10.5km mark for a U-turn back to the stadium. Just 21km of nothing but pure, dark, hard, unforgiving tarmac.
One water point
I had expected some water points along the route, especially at the 5km marker, but this did not turn true. The ‘5km’ board was lonely at the centre of the road with no water point on site. It took sheer will power to just keep running without knowing when this vital hydrate shall be available.
The run was uneventful. They elite runners just sprinted off, while the rest of us veterans tagged along. The runners were quite few, and that meant that the crowd was think, in fact just a file of runners, usually 20-50m apart.
I met the first runners, the fast ones, at a time of 0.38.00. They were already on their way back while I was yet to hit the 10.5km turning point.
Water relief! I meant what a relief! I finally reach the U-turn, to get the first water point, even as I dip my fingers into the basins that contain some ink. Just like the First Lady marathon in March, we have a similar dip-fingers-in-ink situation. Please, invest in some simple timing chip. Those transmitters cost less than a cent for crying out loud!! I briefly glance at my stop watch which reads 0.50.00
One (more) water point
I encounter a second water point on my way back, at the 5km mark. I know it was now there for long, since that is the route I have just been through some 30-minutes ago. One other rule in running is to ensure that you have some water at all time. I apply this rule by throwing away the almost empty bottle that I took at the turn-back point and pick a full one. I run with this to the finishing point.
The way back is easier. I just realize that the first leg was hilly and the way back is generally on a downhill.
111
I hit the finish line inside the Uhuru gardens and the organizers hand me a small piece of paper. The number 111 is written on it. This is my finishing position. I guessed the runners were one hundred only, but maybe I was wrong. However, I doubt if they shall be more than 200, based on the numbers that I encountered on the route.
Another round of recording names on the finishers’ sheet, and then a walk to the tent where the blank finishers’ certificates are issued after they put a big cross with a marker pen on the runner bib having the run number.
The predominantly red lettered cert reads,
“Certificate of Completion – 2016 Sotokoto Safari Half Marathon. This Certificate is hereby awarded to dash dash for succeful completion of the Sotokoto Safari Half Marathon dash dash category (21km/5km) race in a time of dash dash. Awarded on this day of 03rd July 2016. Signed (signed for sure) Douglas Wakiihuri, SS, Race Organiser, Sotokoto Safari Marathon”
The typo on ‘succesful’ is real. I had to re-verify to confirm that this typo shall last with us for eternity.
Good thing is that I shall be having the first certificate to show for this event – which I had previously described as the run with nothing to show – no cert no medal. At least they have now worked the cert part, albeit a dash dash version. Maybe, just maybe, we shall be looking at some medals soon.
This is what I shall fill on one of the dashes… a time of 1.34.18. The other parameters such as distance, calories, average speed, max speed, slow speed were not available since I just replaced the bat of the gadget and forgot to calibrate.
11.11am
I alight from the matatu back home at 11.11am. I finally have my T-shirt as a carryon luggage. I collected this T after the run. The organizers had asked me to check before/after the run. I managed to check after the run, and after sms reminder that, “Pick your size small T-shirt as the only ones remaining”.
I was categorical on the application form that I needed a size L. I was even the eleventh athlete to register. How is it possible that I can get a leftover T-shirt of size small?
“You are lucky,” the gentleman at the secretariat office informed me, “I stumbled upon this size M”
Lucky? Really?
Barack Wamkaya Wanjawa, Nairobi, Kenya, July 3, 2016
One am
I slept at one AM on July 3, 2016 – same day of the big run. Thank Germany for this. I had bet on them winning the quarter final match against Italy at the ongoing UEFA European Champions Football tournament in France. I was confident of sleeping by 11.30pm when they scored their first goal in the second half for the match that started at 10.00pm. However, it was not to be. The game ended 1-1 by 90 minutes. Extra time was a must, and no more goals were scored in the additional 30 minutes.
I was therefore awake past mid-night to witness the penalty shootouts. I have been ‘listening’ to the penalties in the last month, but I discovered that a local free to air channel was showing the matches and had my opportunity to watch the shoot-outs. And who would have expected that both teams can squander three penalties a piece at the initial five kicks each? The match was therefore won on the 9th kick of the extra five kicks. I hope ‘the machine’ does not keep me waiting this long as they advance to the semis. (Read a previous blog story where I lost a bet on some matches leading to this quarter finals stage. I was therefore a bit passionate about my bets at this point. So far all but one had come true. The single miss being the Portugal-Poland tie, where the penalty shoot out let down my Poland bet)
Kumi na moja
That is the time was that I was taking breakfast, ready to leave the house for the bus stage. I was at the Nakuru highway at 5.20am and got into a matatu ten minutes later. I landed at the city centre at six and walked to Haile Sellasie – Uhuru Highway junction to await a vehicle. This next vehicle took me past Nyayo stadium to the diversion at T-Mall, where the left side of the road was already closed and had to share the wrong side of the road with oncoming traffic. I walked from Wilson Airport to Uhuru gardens – a ten minute walk – to warm me up ready for the run.
One toilet
The athletes had already started gathering at Uhuru gardens by the time I arrived at the gardens compound about seven. It is usual to empty the body ready for such a run, and that is what forced me to the usual directions of the washrooms. I was glad to see the single toilet block, though I wondered why they did not think of portable ones or any other way of coping with the expected numbers. Woe to me, when I reached the block to find it locked.
“Wapi choo?,” a colleague in front of me asked the stranger standing around. He could have been an official of Sotokoto or a cop or just someone in some uniform.
“Eh!... Imefungwa?,” he asked and answered himself, “Sijui”
A lady who was just ahead kind of pressed her mid-part with his hands, tried to walk aimlessly, but could not hold it any longer. She just crouched and let go. The two gents, and those behind us, now at an abrupt stop, just out of a locked block, decided to look elsewhere. Luckily, there was a ticket on the fringes of the gardens. The guys just watered the thicket. Those with ‘heavier’ ideas fertilized the thickets, just almost in plain sight.
Saa moja
“Ni saa moja,” someone announced on the public address system, “Twakata kuanza mbio. Wote waende kwa barabara nje ya compound hii.”
For the benefit of the foreigners, evidently Japanese, who were the main sponsored, she translated, “We are about to start the run. All are asked to get out of this compound to the main road.”
Soon a crowd gathered outside Uhuru gardens, on the tarmac road now closed to traffic, next to some two signs of both of the road, written “START”
First Lady
We got to learn that the run shall be flagged off by the first lady of the republic, Mrs. UK. Time started running and no sight of our host. Runners just milled around, some in chatter, others in thought. Some took selfies, others watched them take them. Some warmed up, others stayed put. Some complained loudly of the delay, others were indifferent.
Three outrider motorbikes followed by three dark Mercedes Benz saloons signaled the arrival of the guest. A fourth big van, same dark colour, followed at the rear. As usual, these machinery forcefully ejected the once settled runners out of the comfort of the tarmac and had to seek refuge on the road side for the 30-second duration of the drama.
One hundred
One hundred is the number of runners that I counted at the starting line. Is this not the worst publicized run in Nairobi? Raising only 100 runners out of a city of over 1 million!? Is this a joke or what? I wonder why the organizers cannot raise the numbers, when other runs are twice expensive in terms of registration fees and these usually marshal over five thousand runners.
This was the worst attended run ever. I was been to other three Sotokotos in the past, 2009, 2010 and 2013, but none was this bad. I tend to think that the organizers just woke up some day in mid-June and decided that they are holding the run. Contrast that to the Nairobi International marathon, for example, which is already registered runners for the October event, over 3 months in advance. And, this is just because it is local. Other international runs at the big arenas in the US and UK register runners almost one year to the event, and close half year before the run.
July 1
Looking back, I was at Uhuru gardens secretariat office of Sotokoto on Friday, July 1 to collect my run number and kit. This was after receiving official communication that the kits would be ready for all to collect from 9.00am on that Friday and the following day only. I was taken aback as to how they can issue the runner kits just 48-hours to the event, for all the runners that they were expecting? Had they deliberately orchestrated this run to fail or what? How many people can collect kits within 48-hours at such a remote location? It took me two hours on two public transport vehicles to get to these offices (plus a third broken down matatu and double the fare as a consequence).
“We do not have T-shirts yet,” the lady at the unmarked reception and the equally concealed secretariat office started when she saw my approach. The reason why I was able to trace this office location was due to precedence. I just recalled where I got it three years ago. Without that experience I could have been lost.
“What do you mean?,” was my answer. They had communicated to me that I should pick the gear, and here they were telling me that there was nothing. Could they not get their act together first before inconveniencing such philanthropic runners?
1pm
She tried to explain that the kits were late, though they had the run numbers only at the moment. She said something about suppliers, delays, expected after 1pm, come back later, or come back tomorrow.
“I come from Uthiru, which is in a different province” I told her, “I am not coming back here! Get me someone who shall give me a solution.”
She hesitated.
“Make no mistake,” I reiterated, “Am not coming back to Langata road until Sunday.”
There is nothing that breaks the toughest of situations that some simple words, which I encountered when finally some guy came into the office, “Apologies, we are very sorry that the T-Shirts are not available yet. Truly sorry. Accept our apologies.”
What say you, when someone apologizes over a situation? You are completely broken down and your defenses are no longer in place.
“Get me the run number. I shall use a previous T-Shirt,” I assisted them.
0011
Was I really runner no. 11? I registered for the event on June 15, having received an invitation through email the previous day. The registration fee was KShs.1,050 – a strange figure, but when I finally saw the receipt showing only 1,000/=, I understood that the organizers did not want to incur any processing charges through the PesaPal platform that was handling the online payments.
If it was true that I was the eleventh runner, based on the run number, then the registration for this event was worse than I thought. Add to the delay in providing runner kits in time and you have a situation at your hands.
One stanza
We sung one stanza of the national anthem just after her excellence arrived. Thereafter, it was a matter of the flag off though a countdown from 10. At count 1, the blast of a starter gun was heard and all started the run. I started my timer.
The run route had changed. I have run from the Nairobi National park to Nyayo stadium and back as was the inaugural run circuit or from Uhuru gardens to Nyayo stadium with two loops and back, as was my second run in Sotokoto two.
This third run on Sotokoto 6 was taking advantage of the newly build Southern by-pass that connects Langata road to Nakuru highway. It was a simple enough route – a run from Uhuru gardens, straight to the by-pass to head towards Ngong forest side upto the 10.5km mark for a U-turn back to the stadium. Just 21km of nothing but pure, dark, hard, unforgiving tarmac.
One water point
I had expected some water points along the route, especially at the 5km marker, but this did not turn true. The ‘5km’ board was lonely at the centre of the road with no water point on site. It took sheer will power to just keep running without knowing when this vital hydrate shall be available.
The run was uneventful. They elite runners just sprinted off, while the rest of us veterans tagged along. The runners were quite few, and that meant that the crowd was think, in fact just a file of runners, usually 20-50m apart.
I met the first runners, the fast ones, at a time of 0.38.00. They were already on their way back while I was yet to hit the 10.5km turning point.
Water relief! I meant what a relief! I finally reach the U-turn, to get the first water point, even as I dip my fingers into the basins that contain some ink. Just like the First Lady marathon in March, we have a similar dip-fingers-in-ink situation. Please, invest in some simple timing chip. Those transmitters cost less than a cent for crying out loud!! I briefly glance at my stop watch which reads 0.50.00
One (more) water point
I encounter a second water point on my way back, at the 5km mark. I know it was now there for long, since that is the route I have just been through some 30-minutes ago. One other rule in running is to ensure that you have some water at all time. I apply this rule by throwing away the almost empty bottle that I took at the turn-back point and pick a full one. I run with this to the finishing point.
The way back is easier. I just realize that the first leg was hilly and the way back is generally on a downhill.
111
I hit the finish line inside the Uhuru gardens and the organizers hand me a small piece of paper. The number 111 is written on it. This is my finishing position. I guessed the runners were one hundred only, but maybe I was wrong. However, I doubt if they shall be more than 200, based on the numbers that I encountered on the route.
Another round of recording names on the finishers’ sheet, and then a walk to the tent where the blank finishers’ certificates are issued after they put a big cross with a marker pen on the runner bib having the run number.
The predominantly red lettered cert reads,
“Certificate of Completion – 2016 Sotokoto Safari Half Marathon. This Certificate is hereby awarded to dash dash for succeful completion of the Sotokoto Safari Half Marathon dash dash category (21km/5km) race in a time of dash dash. Awarded on this day of 03rd July 2016. Signed (signed for sure) Douglas Wakiihuri, SS, Race Organiser, Sotokoto Safari Marathon”
The typo on ‘succesful’ is real. I had to re-verify to confirm that this typo shall last with us for eternity.
Good thing is that I shall be having the first certificate to show for this event – which I had previously described as the run with nothing to show – no cert no medal. At least they have now worked the cert part, albeit a dash dash version. Maybe, just maybe, we shall be looking at some medals soon.
This is what I shall fill on one of the dashes… a time of 1.34.18. The other parameters such as distance, calories, average speed, max speed, slow speed were not available since I just replaced the bat of the gadget and forgot to calibrate.
11.11am
I alight from the matatu back home at 11.11am. I finally have my T-shirt as a carryon luggage. I collected this T after the run. The organizers had asked me to check before/after the run. I managed to check after the run, and after sms reminder that, “Pick your size small T-shirt as the only ones remaining”.
I was categorical on the application form that I needed a size L. I was even the eleventh athlete to register. How is it possible that I can get a leftover T-shirt of size small?
“You are lucky,” the gentleman at the secretariat office informed me, “I stumbled upon this size M”
Lucky? Really?
Barack Wamkaya Wanjawa, Nairobi, Kenya, July 3, 2016
