By Husna Muhdhar,
Eliud Kipchoge and British professional cycling team, Ineos Grenadiers, have teamed up to open a cycling academy in Kenya.
The renowned Kaptagat camp, which houses Kipchoge’s running training facility, will now be home to the Ineos Eliud Kipchoge Cycling Academy.
“I’m proud that we are expanding our Kaptagat based training camp from a purely athletics focussed training camp towards a wider kind of sports academy. The INEOS Eliud Kipchoge Cycling Academy is a very natural fit with great potential,” Kipchoge Tweeted.
INEOS chairman Sir Jim Ratcliffe, said it was an exciting venture and the business wished to support the “exciting sporting talent, enthusiasm, and ambition” of Africa.
The billionaire chairman was convinced the partnership with the double Olympic champion and world marathon record holder was ideal, after he recently visited the Kaptagat facility.
“There is such exciting sporting talent, passion and ambition in Africa and at INEOS we want to continue to invest to help realise its maximum potential. I visited the Kaptagat facility in Kenya recently and came away convinced that this partnership can do something truly different and unique for cycling – as well as for aspiring young African athletes,” he said.
By opening a new academy in Kenya, Ineos hopes to reaffirm its continued commitment to the growth of cycling in Africa.
Ineos hopes that the collaboration will promote cycling in Africa and provide aspiring young African athletes more possibilities. According to Ineos, their goal with the ongoing investment is to maximize the partnership’s potential so that it can benefit both parties.
The opening of the academy comes barely one month after Biniam Girmay of Eritrea made history by becoming the first black African to win a Grand Tour stage at the Giro d’Italia.
“This is a significant and exciting development in world cycling – it has the power to drive lasting change by developing new riders from Africa,” said Sir Dave Brailsford, director of sport at Ineos.
“We all know the talent is there – we’ve seen it this year with Biniam Girmay’s history-making successes at the Giro d’Italia and Gent-Wevelgem, and I saw it first-hand in the inspiring young athletes I met in Kaptagat.”
