Ferdinand Omanyala has credited one key factor that revitalised his training and enabled him deliver a strong 2024 season, setting sights on the 2025 World Championships.
As the 2023 season came to an end, Africa’s fastest man Ferdinand Omanyala made a bold move to coaches and hope for a brighter start to his 2024 season.
Omanyala was coming off a disastrous 2023 that saw him fail to impress at the World Championships in Budapest, Hungary and was not going to tolerate making the same mistakes in 2024.
So, he dropped his former coach Duncan Ayiemba and started working with Geoffrey Kimani. He has since admitted that making the move was one of the greatest investments he made in 2024.
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Kishane Thompson and Tia Clayton opened their 2025 season with impressive victories in Jamaica, setting personal bests as they aim to build on strong performances from 2024.
In an interview with NBC Sports last season, Ferdinand Omanyala disclosed that he never used to be a fan of training but after starting to train under Kimani, things have been seamless.
The Commonwealth Games champion pointed out that back then, he always used to look forward to races since his training routine would change a bit and not be as hard but now, he has fallen in love with training under Kimani, who focuses on his mental well-being and social life too.
“Honestly, I’ve never liked training. There are moments when I would go to sessions angry and would have to tell myself ‘you have to cool down and just handle this’. I would walk into a session and feel down before the session even started,” Ferdinand Omanyala said.
“But now, I get to training and I’m happy and excited. Everything is just right. I have the feeling that everything is okay and I’m ready to handle this. Previously, I would always look forward to races because if I had a race, my program would be cut in half and I would have to do less. But now I look forward to training and I want to get better.”
Ferdinand Omanyala added that the 2024 season was one of the best, considering they changed a lot of things from what he had been doing for the past seven years.
He added that under Duncan Ayiemba, there were a lot of things they did, revealing that it has been cut down and he enjoys training more than anything.
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Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce has discussed the pressure to break Flo-Jo’s 100m world record, insisting that while it’s a goal, it doesn’t consume her focus.
“In the past I started with endurance runs, then started cutting down, and doing speed. But this time, we started with speed because he says you can’t have speed endurance without speed,” the 29-year-old said.
“One good thing about his program is we never repeat sessions so that makes training interesting. It’s been helpful mentally, physically, and emotionally. The results are very good and I’m excited as we go into the outdoor season.”
Ferdinand Omanyala ended his season as the second-fastest man in the world with his 9.79 seconds behind Kishane Thompson. At the Paris Olympic Games, things did not go as planned as he failed to make the cut to the final.
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US sprint king Noah Lyles has opened up on how his Jamaican rival Kishane Thompson forced him to change his pre-race antics after stealing a march on him at Paris Olympics.
However, the Kenyan spring king wants to make amends this season, mainly focusing on the 2025 World Championships in Tokyo, Japan.
