Ethiopia ranks 92 out of 95 on the UN's human poverty index, but amongst the world's top nations when it comes to its athletes. So how can the runners of this poverty-ridden country achieve their potential? Louise Williams reports from Yirgalem, in the south of Ethiopia.
It's 6 a.m. and the sun is just starting to rise over the town stadium in Yirgalem, a town five hours drive from the capital Addis Ababa. Runners are arriving at the stadium on foot or on bicycles, wiping the sleep from their eyes before they start stretching to warm up for their daily ritual of an hour's hard training on the dirt track.
 Stride Ethiopia athletes training as the sun rises. |
This is no well-funded, well-tended track; leafy branches are used to mark out their training spot, the grass grows high in patches and, as for the runners, about 1 in 2 are training barefoot.
Challenge
"It's a challenge because their family may need them to earn money or work in the home," explains coach Shisema. "And because of poverty, they may not be getting enough to eat. So the Stride programme provides one meal a day to try to make sure that they are getting the right nutrition."
Stride Ethiopia is an Irish charity set up to provide funds for young athletes in this rural area where life expectancy is only 48.
"There's no time for fun in life here," says Stride Ethiopia's aid director Emer Woodful. "When you're concerned with basic survival, then sport is way down the list of priorities. We think it shouldn't be, so we're providing coaching they wouldn't otherwise be getting, we are providing breakfast after training, and we also fund trips to competitions."
One of the biggest obstacles to joining a club like Stride is family. Matthias is 17 years old, he goes to school and he works to support his parents. At first his father refused to allow him to train, but once Matthias started to win medals, his father changed his mind.
"I do this in my extra time, it doesn't clash with my school hours," says Matthias. "I think I will be a great runner one day, modelling the great runners of Ethiopia, I will be one of them."
Haile Gebrselassie
The greatest runner of all in Ethiopia is Haile Gebrselassie, who has broken 25 world records and won numerous Olympic and World Championship titles, he's a hot tip for the Olympics this year. But Haile started off facing just as many challenges as Stride's members do today.
"When I started running when I was 15 I had a big problem with my father, we were fighting," explains the current world marathon record holder. "My father wanted me to be a lawyer, a teacher or something else. He thought running was just a pastime, for fun, so that was one of the obstacles."
 Wishu, one of the club's strongest runners |
Haile Gebrselassie is well known for his unusual running posture, with his left arm crooked from carrying books when he was running to school. He wore hand-me-downs from his brother and was thrilled and terrified in equal measure when he got his first pair of running shoes for a race in Addis Ababa.
"I remember I slept with them on," he laughs. "I was sharing a hotel room with a friend but I thought he might take them from me, so I kept them on all night, for fear of losing the chance to compete!"
Unique
There are many local and international charities working in Ethiopia to try and raise its people out of poverty. But Stride Ethiopia is unique in putting sport first.
"The right to sport may not seem like an obvious right when you're dealing with basic survival," explains Emer Woodful. "But it is important because it entails the right to bodily integrity, to good nutrition. Other rights flow from it - the right to education, the right to discipline, and the commitment that grows from being involved with sport. We hope the kind of skills they learn from running will carry through in their wider lives."
Tags: Africa, Ethiopia, Haile Gebrselassie, right to sport, run, runner, running, Stride Ethiopia