Merry Christmas

My big news on Christmas eve is that I got my official invite to the wedding of Charles Koech and Mary Keitany.

My official wedding invitation

It is being held on New Years Eve and I am really excited for a number of reasons. First, I've wanted to go to an African wedding for ages as they sound as though they are really good fun. Second, it's a proper celebrity wedding as in Kenya Mary is a huge superstar (and well know in most running circles around the world). I have been told that many of the top Kenyan athletes will be attending so I must make sure that my camera is fully charged. Third, it will be a great way to end 2011!

After receiving my invite I realised that apart from running gear (not very appropriate for a wedding) I had nothing to wear! So I took a trip to the market in Iten with Gavin and got myself kitted out in a nice suit (Hugo Boss!) and shirt for the horrendously expensive price of about £6!!! Now I'm all ready to bust some moves on the dance floor come the 31^st of December!!

Looking very smart!!

Talking of Mary Keitany, it was the Shoe 4 Africa Women’s 5km in Iten today and probably one of the only chances that any women would get to beat Mary as she jogged round near the back with some of the children! It was a really good event, all the entrants were given a free t-shirt and the first 10 finishers got some good prize money, including $500 for first place and a $1000 bonus for breaking the course record (which the winner did today). We did see one women cheat and jump in for the last 100m but she duly got disqualified. After the race they have a raffle where all the raffle winners get a pair of donated shoes.

Mary jogging the Shoe 4 Africa 5km

For a treat on Christmas day coach Gavin has given me a 35km run but once I finish that I get the rest of the day to relax :-) I have purchased loads of packs of biscuits for all the kids that live near me and will hand these out some time in the morning as I bet most of them don't get anything. I have also been invited to have my Christmas lunch with Ken Kibet, Helen Kimauti and their family which should be really good fun.

I hope everyone I know has a really good Christmas. To all my Kenyan and international buddies keep training hard and to all my friends in the UK I will see you in 2012!!