Kilimanjaro Marathon 2011

7 years ago they held the first Kilimanjaro Marathon. It is sponsored by the Kilimanjaro Beer Company and Vodacom, a large mobile phone company. The first race had 400 competitors and now they have 4000 in total. It is a registered international race with a full and half marathon. There is also a ‘fun run’ that is 5 km and Roman and I participated in that this year. We raced this past Sunday February 27th and we felt very much a part of the Moshi community. The fun run started at 7:15 in the morning to take advantage of the coolness that Moshi experiences in the early mornings before the town heats up over the day. The mountain was cloudless and watched over the crowd in all its glory. I never get tired of that mountain…
I was impressed by all of our efforts. We all ran the race with stopping just for water breaks. They guided us all back into the stadium to the finish line. WE did make it back before the first half marathoner arrived at least! It was great to stand at the finish line to cheer on the winners…all first place winners were..you guessed it-Kenyan! The third place marathoner was actually Tanzanian and as he ran across the finish line, the crowd erupted!! The festivities soon began and people were drinking beer at 8:45 in the morning….I have attached a bunch of pictures of the stadium and some of the runners coming across the finish line.
They announcer said there were runners from 35 countries represented in the races, a truly international race. It was great to see so many Tanzanian families out participating in the fun run. There were also many NGO’s represented there with team shirts…..Pamoja Tunaweza definitely needs a team entry next year for the fun run.
Finally, the thing that struck me the most was the footwear, or, lack therof. There were young men on the half marathon with broken shoes, house slippers, converse basketball shoes, soccer cleats and, yes….flip flops…..and, they all finished before the first white person that I saw cross the line with their fancy running gear.