The previous girls’s marathon world document holder has reportedly switched her allegiance forward of the upcoming LA 2028 Video games.
Brigid Kosgei was born in Kenya and competed for the East African nation in all 5 of her World Marathon Main wins, in addition to her silver medal on the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. However the relationship together with her delivery nation seems to have come to an finish.
Kosgei, who set the ladies’s marathon world document of two:14:04 on the 2019 Chicago Marathon, was listed alongside 2024 Olympic silver medallist Ronald Kwemoi, Catherine Amanang’ole, Brian Kibor and Nelvin Jepkemboi in a now-deleted social media put up from the Turkish Athletics Federation saying 5 new nationwide group members.
On Wednesday, Kenyan journalist Katami Michelle confirmed that a number of Kenyan distance runners, together with Kosgei, have determined to modify their sporting allegiance to Turkey forward of the 2028 Olympics.
Following up on SM stories, I’m reliably knowledgeable that Kenyan athletes led by Brigid Kosgei (former marathon world document holder) have switched their allegiance to Turkey forward of @LA28 Olympics.
Others are:-
Ronald Kwemoi
Catherine Amanang’ole
Brian Kibor
Nelvin Jepkemboi pic.twitter.com/LoZEjXH53J— Katami Michelle (@MichKatami) January 21, 2026
Why the change?
The motive behind Kosgei’s transfer has not been made public. Nonetheless, Turkey has struggled to foster homegrown expertise in athletics on the final two Olympic Video games. In a sport the place many elite athletes are underpaid or under-supported, Turkey’s aggressive recruitment technique shouldn’t come as a shock.
On the Paris 2024 Video games, Turkey fielded a small athletics group of 16 athletes and did not win a single medal. The nation’s highest end was a fifth-place outcome within the males’s pole vault remaining by Ersu Şaşma, and solely two athletes reached finals of their respective occasions. Now, the Turkish Athletics Federation (TAF) needs to vary course.
Based on the unpublished record, nearly 30 per cent of the athletes that make up Turkey’s nationwide group have beforehand competed beneath one other flag.
Final yr, two Jamaican throwers and jumpers, together with Nigerian sprinter and 2022 Commonwealth Video games 200m silver medallist Favour Ofili, switched their allegiance to Turkey. Every athlete reportedly obtained a US$500,000 signing bonus, month-to-month stipends and efficiency incentives that embody a $380,000 bonus for Olympic gold and an extra $190,000 for setting an Olympic document.
Is athlete poaching turning into an issue?
Athletes altering nationwide affiliations isn’t a brand new factor. Many Olympians have switched allegiances to realize higher entry to funding and amenities, or to enhance their probabilities of making a nationwide group in a rustic with much less depth. Nonetheless, the act of wealthier federations recruiting world-class athletes to spice up their medal possibilities has develop into extra frequent over the previous decade.
In 2022, Kenyan steeplechase star Norah Jeruto switched her allegiance to Kazakhstan, reportedly seeking higher aggressive alternatives. That very same yr, she ran a championship document within the girls’s 3,000m steeplechase and gained Kazakhstan’s first-ever gold medal at a World Athletics Championships.
One other Kenyan-born steeplechaser, Winfred Yavi, took on the same supply from Bahrain. The Bahraini Olympic Committee reportedly supplied her with a wage, housing and efficiency bonuses tied to her incomes medals and setting data.
The highest East African distance runners aren’t the one athletes being focused. Olympic 200m champion Letsile Tebogo of Botswana mentioned in a radio interview in December that he had obtained a number of presents from Qatar, the UAE and Tunisia for him to vary his nationality. He mentioned the sums had been substantial, although he declined. “It’s one thing that’s all the time on the desk,” Tebogo admitted.
Ought to World Athletics cease it?
Beneath the present World Athletics switch guidelines, all athletes should wait three years after representing their authentic nation earlier than competing for a brand new one. Solely beneath sure circumstances is the three-year course of voided, just like the case of former Belarusian sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, who defected through the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and later transferred to symbolize Poland. She fled her nation after officers tried to power her onto a aircraft dwelling, and her switch was permitted inside the yr so she may proceed coaching.
It was the same case for the Nigerian sprinter, Ofili, who cited “negligence” from Nigeria’s athletics authorities as the rationale behind her swap to Turkey.
Beneath World Athletics guidelines, there’s no guideline in place stopping athletes from looking for allegiance to a different nation for financial achieve. Personally, I believe it is smart for a Kenyan or Ethiopian runner to pursue these alternatives, given the depth of distance‑operating expertise in their very own nations. If you happen to can assure a spot on an Olympic group, together with the perks and a bag of cash that comes with it, why not give your self the possibility?
The place I draw the road is with the concept of a free‑agent frenzy in worldwide athletics. When you open that door, you find yourself with one thing that appears like the present state of Main League Baseball: the richest proprietor scooping up the very best expertise yearly (L.A. Dodgers), and the opposite 29 groups are left with homegrown expertise. That mannequin has no place in international sport.
If the development of big-name athletes switching nationwide groups continues, an athlete’s allegiance could begin to symbolize greenback indicators greater than nationwide glory and pleasure; it may basically change what makes the Olympics the Olympics.
