NAIROBI, Kenya, August 7 – Kenya’s Abraham Kibiwott clinched bronze in the men’s 3000m steeplechase at the Paris Olympics in a dramatic final at the Stade France on Wednesday night.
The Commonwealth Games champion clocked 8:06.47 in a thrilling finish in which Soufiane El Bakkali defended his Olympics title by clocking 8:06.05 in first place.
American Kenneth Rooks took silver after clocking 8:06.41 to finish second.
Other Kenyans in the race, Simon Koech (8:09.26) and Amos Serem (8:19.74) finished seventh and 14th respectively.
The highlight of the race was the fall of world record holder Lamecha Girma of Ethiopia, who tripped and fell over the hurdle in the last lap to all but kiss his Olympics hopes goodbye.
Bakkali himself had seemed to be flirting with fire when, with 800m to go, was mired deep with the middle of the pack as Koech and Girma seemed to peel away.
However, as is customary, the tall Moroccan’s powerful kick came to the rescue and with Koech tiring away, he tore through past Rooks who had taken a shock lead with 200m to go.
Kibiwott, who had his eyes on Bakkali, took the cue and tried to match the Moroccan speed-for-speed but unluckily had to be content with bronze.
It is his second bronze after a similar finish at last year’s World Championships in Budapest where Bakkali successfully defended his title.
Overall, Bakkali’s win means Kenyan will have to swallow the bitter pill of the fact that its longstanding dominance of this race is now history.
