With big white rockstar sunglasses which he never removes not even for a second, the champion Gillias makes his come back after a season in which his job a bricklayer kept him away from the Never Give Up of last year. A slow start for Gillias, but when the Senior group reaches the starting point of the Junior his fantastic catch up among the loud cheering of the young ones ‘Giko, Giko’. A triumphant comeback which makes him conquer the first place. Continue reading
11 of our athletes U14 successfully participated at the first IOC Presidential Challenge in Lusaka, a truck&field duathlon.
They wanted to participate, to win, to grow, and to defeat big boys still affected by age cheating.
W sport and its values!
Malaria accentuates my very low inclination to waking up early, I have ended up hating 
Billie Jean of Michael Jackson which is my alarm clock lately, but I could not sleep, it was not the ham race of Busto Garolfo, but the selections for the Youth African Championshipss which will be held in Nigeria from 28 to 31 March. Only athletes of sixteen and seventeen years old can participate, with the only exception of those who are 15. Continue reading
It took us thirteen editions to run fro Mungu to Chikupi … and was it not for the rain which
turned the black soil between Kabwesa and Chikupi into quick sand we would not have run it today either!
Many athletes as it is custom around here when it rains did not move from their houses … they say that travelling with the rain it is dangerous especially for the risk to catch malaria … the 170 who know that malaria is not caught like this presented themselves punctual at the departure together with our exceptional guest the Italian Ambassador in Zambia Pier Mario Daccò who with his Land Rover opened the race and picked up hurt athletes or pretending ones … Continue reading
Eight girls in the first 10 of the 10 km!
It is true that we missed out the first place … but from the second down, apart from the ninth, the name Sport2build resounded non-stop in the parking lot of the Levy shopping mall … I think that the customers of the shopping mall must have thought of a stuck disc, or of the subliminal advertisement of something to buy somewhere on the shelves of the supermarket … but that Sport2build, Sport2build, Sport2build … was simply the realization of a job started almost seven years ago … where sport, done as much as possible well, becomes a tool for growth and social inclusion, and where we always insisted on the female presence … the CEO of Lafarge (the cement multinational which sponsored the marathon) was impressed by these young girls from 11 years old and above, with the agile and elegant stride despite the barefoot, who literally dominated the 10,000 … so much that he has promised to sponsor our next activities … hopefully he will keep his promise! Continue reading
When I first came to Zambia, seven years ago, it was said that the first rain comes for
Independence Day, the 24th October, this year in Kafue we are exactly a month late, there have been a couple of showers but nothing more. Today it is very hot, just after a couple of kilometers we see many athletes with the t-shirt in the hands and the sweat coming down from face and chest. The clouds are there but striking, when the wind pushes them under the sun they gift us a few minutes of shade which allows the boys and girls to breath. Like always when we arrive in Chaniana a lot of people comes at the sides of the road to cheer and offer water, Insist Maunga, home idol, was cheered along non-stop in the last kilometers which from the school take to the fishers’ port on the Kafue River. Insist, a program just in the name, runs with us since the beginning in the Juniors he was always among the first ones, now he is a constant presence in the first ten of the Seniors, where though he still misses the victory. His best race of the year was the test for the first Lusaka Marathon of next Saturday where he showed unexpected resistance which leaves us hoping for the best. Continue reading
Paul, Maximillian, Miko, Most and Samson, Milika, Yvonne, Charity, Astrida and Priscilla …
They are the ten finalists of the cross-country race under 14 organized by the Olympic Centre of Lusaka under the programme: I.O.C. President’s Athletic Challenge.
Our 10 children arrive from different rural areas, far one from the other even about thirty kilometers.
Today 17th November, there is the final and the departure of the race is supposed to be at 8 in the morning. Continue reading
So many common places for the shortest race of the circuit!
‘The seasons are no longer the way they once were’, the rain season is late this year and the torrid heat made the shortest race of the circuit more demanding. ‘Nothing drenches your thirst more than a glass of water’, at the arrival the manual water pump of the Mungu School is assaulted by the young thirsty athletes. ‘Nothing is more refreshing than the shade of a tree’, at the end the 250 participants fought for a place under one of the huge secular mangoes in the schoolyard. Continue reading
Almost 200 participants … but at the departure the Seniors are few, “ it is the distance to scare them away” says the coach from Chipapa. But this reason which we heard way too often does not convince me. Continue reading
Friday evening with no power in Kafue. ‘Survivors’ dinner at candle light, with milk, cereal,
bread, Egyptian spiced bread sticks, jam and many pawpaw from Chikupi. The children eat a lot foreseeing the first race, then Winnie the eldest, who will race for the first time in the over 12, says ‘before the start, I am always a bit tense and worried, it seems to me that at the departure I will not be able to start, to run for the all race, then after the start and the elbowing, everything goes and I only think about reaching the arrival’. Still she did not know, that despite the TB of the bones, which crippled her stride, she would arrive fifth … for the first time … Continue reading
