Ezekiel Kemboi has dominated the men’s 3000m steeplechase race in the world for a long time.
The athlete holds a number of titles to his name including the 2004 and 2012 Olympic gold medals, 2009, 2011, 2013 and 2015 World Championships gold medals among other prestigious performances.
However, after Kemboi announced his retirement from the steeplechase spot in 2017, Conseslus Kipruto has risen fast and without any doubt, he is the perfect replacement for Kemboi.
Born December 8, 1994, Kipruto has a brilliant sprinting ability and has beaten his rivals in the last lap on many occasions to win gold.
He even outclassed Kemboi in the 2017 World Championships final in London. Kipruto is a steeplechaser who has zeal, discipline and positive attitude whenever he is in and out of the track. He won gold in the 2011 World Junior games and in 2012 the World Junior titles in the steeplechase.
He also ranks second on the all-time junior lists with 8:01.16.
Conseslus Kipruto is the reigning Olympic and World Champion in the steeplechase, his personal best of 8:00.12 minutes for the 3000 m steeplechase which was set at the Birmingham Diamond League event in 2016.
The manner in which he radically rose through the younger categories of the sport, beginning in 2010 is simply amazing. He won the Kenyan youth trials in the 2000 metres steeplechase with a world-leading mark of 5:29.3 minutes and ran his first Kenyan cross country race in 2013.
After a win at the Cross Internacional Juan Muguerza and third at the Cross Internacional de Itálica in Spain, he only just made the junior team at the Kenyan trials, placing sixth.
The manner which he has risen to the occasion on several occasions makes me opine that he is the perfect replacement of Kemboi and all upcoming steeplechasers should benchmark him.