Mary Moraa’s road to gold at the 800 meters…

This is Stuart Weir’s piece with Mary Moraa. Mary Moraa moved from 400 meters to the 800 meters and has made an incredible move from the one lapper to the two lapper, and in less than three years, takes gold at the World Champs. This is her story. 

Mary Moraa

The women’s 800m at the Budapest World Championship was one of the most eagerly awaited races. Would the Olympic champion, Athing Mu, run, and in what kind of form would she be after hardly racing all year? After medalling at the previous World Championships and the Olympics, could Keely Hodkinson win her first global gold? And what about Mary Moraa? In the end, it was the Kenyan who triumphed.

Mary’s early life was challenging, with both her parents dying when she was a child.  She grew up with her grandparents in Kisii in western Kenya – which has earned her the nickname the Kisii Express. Like so many Kenyans, Mary Moraa started running in primary school, but, in her words, there was “no support” at that stage, and it was only when she reached high school that she started running more seriously, being selected in 2017 for the Kenyan team in the World Under 18 championships, in Nairobi. She finished second in the 400m in 53.31. The following year, she was 5^th in the World U20s in Finland, again at 400m. She also enjoyed playing football when it did not clash with athletics.  She told me that as far as the Premier League was concerned, Chelsea was “her team”!  She credits her school principal for helping her athletic development, linking her with her first coach, and beyond that, treating her like his own daughter. In an interview for World Athletics, she said that it was a great sadness for her that her parents did not live to see her success.

In 2019, she ran the 400m at the Doha World Championships, reaching the semi-final and finishing fifth in 52.11.  The race proved to be a pivotal moment. She recalled: “I was given lane nine, and I was not comfortable with that because I knew the race would be between athletes in lanes 3,4,5 and 6. I knew it would be hard to run a good time from lane 9”. 

She had a talk with Hellen Obiri, from the same community in Kenya, who had become a friend. Hellen’s advice was to stop running 400s and to start learning to run the 800m. With the pandemic effectively wiping out the 2020 season, she had time to train for the longer distance. Mary remains…