by Justin LagatJustin Lagat will be covering the 2021 U20 World Athletics Championships, to be held in Nairobi, from This Wednesday, August 18 to Sunday, August 22.
Justin’s travels to Nairobi, his Covid tests, and the planning needed to cover this event is a story in itself. 100 countries will be in Nairobi, although they will not include the US, among others.
The meet is a major view into some of the key stars developing for 2028 and 2032. Watch closely!
Safaraicom Stadium, photo by World Athletics
I am getting excited to begin a series of stories on the coverage of the world under 20 championships that will begin on Wednesday the 18th of August here in Nairobi.
The enthusiastic crowds, the electric atmosphere, and those excitements at the Safaricom Stadium in Kasarani in 2017, during the world under 18 championships are what remains in the memory of many, and could be one of the biggest reasons why Kenya also won the bid to host the 2021 world under 20 championships.
But, everything will be different this year, even from the way everyone is traveling and walking around in masks. Like me, many have had to wait to clear some COVID 19 clearance protocols first before proceeding to get their accreditation cards, which I am yet to get, given some challenges with the new protocols to be followed also within the stadium.
Change is inevitable, but it brings both the good and the bad.
As I reflected on all these changes, I could not help but wonder; perhaps if the world would suddenly stop rotating, it may just take a week, or so before we shall all have forgotten that it used to rotate as we adjust to a new “normal life.”
After all, there are far too many good things that have happened as well. The world of athletics is now having better coverage on the internet more than before. The world under 20 championships will be streamed live on YouTube and on Facebook channels.
An old cab driver should not be complaining about the invention of Google maps navigation, that people no longer rely so much on them to get directions in new places, instead, they should be finding ways to make good use of the new changes.
While we used to enjoy the excitement of a full stadium during big events like this, the present-day excitement will now come from watching the event live on different platforms, then converging together on social media, and also at RunBlogRun, to hear what others had to say about it.
The Olympic Games just happened under similar circumstances and interesting topics trended on social media after viewers began to talk about the event. The incident of the French marathon runner, Morhad Amdouni knocking down bottles of water at a drink station may have just simply passed like that, but some viewers captured the moment and replayed the video clip on social media, and people who may not even have watched the race itself expressed their different opinions on the internet about the marathon race, others were eager to know the position that the runner eventually took after inconveniencing other runners.
We hope to recapture some great moments from these games that will spark conversations on the internet about the runners who will be participating at the world event beginning on Wednesday.
