Kenya underlined its growing strength in age-group swimming at the ANOCA Zone V Youth Games Swimming Championships in Nairobi, finishing top of the standings with 23 medals.
The hosts collected 12 gold, 10 silver and one bronze medal, to comfortably dominate the event held at the Kasarani Aquatic Arena on Wednesday, 26 and Thursday, 27 August.Following Kenya in second place were neighbours Uganda, who finished with three gold, three silver and three bronze medals.Rwanda collected six bronze medals to finish third, while Tanzania, Ethiopia and Sudan each won a bronze.
The swimming competition, which featured swimmers aged 14 to 17 years, brought together seven countries, including hosts Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Sudan and Burundi.With regards to individual performances, Kenya’s Jeremy Rieck and Macrine Kalombo emerged as the standouts, with each swimmer taking home two gold medals from different race events.
Rieck achieved this by winning both the boys’ 50m and 100m butterfly, timing 25.66 and 58.83 seconds respectively.Renowned US coach watches as Kinda, young swimmers impress at National Junior Championships in NanyukiIn the 50m event, the Kenyan finished ahead of compatriot Andrew Ogola, who clocked 27.13, with Uganda’s Jonathan Kaweesa taking bronze in 27.40.In the 100m event, Rieck and Ogola also took the Kenyan one-two, with the latter clocking 1:04.98, and Rwanda’s Sheja Kean Murenzi closing out the podium places in 1:08.64.Kalombo, on the other hand, flexed her muscles in the freestyle and breaststroke, winning the 100m freestyle in 1:03.01, before powering her way to another victory in the 50m breaststroke, touching in at 37.05 seconds.
In the 100m freestyle, Kalombo finished ahead of teammate Isabelle Mwangi, who clocked 1:04.30, and edged Kenya’s Kamwelle Maina (37.51) in the 50m breaststroke. Ethiopia’s Samrawi Demilie Akele took third in 44.19.Another eye-catching performance from Team Kenya came from Baraka Nyakundi in the boys’ 50m freestyle, as he took gold in a time of 25.29 seconds.Nyakundi, in taking the win, edged compatriot Isaiah Gitonga, who touched in at 25.72, while Uganda’s Kaweesa finished third in 26.05.Form Four student leaves Malkia Strikers captain in awe following stunning debutKenya also showed its depth in the relays, winning the mixed 4x100m freestyle relay in 4:04.20, ahead of Uganda’s 4:11.17 and Rwanda’s 4:25.16.The hosts followed that with victory in the mixed 4x100m medley relay, touching in 4:51.08, ahead of Uganda in 5:03.70, and Rwanda in 5:12.64.
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The Zone V Games brought together young athletes from across the region in several sports, and formed part of the build-up towards the Dakar. With swimming on the Dakar 2026 programme, Kenya will therefore be looking at using these performances to boost their results at the games that will see both boys and girls compete across freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and individual medley events.Chege keen to rewrite wrongs ahead of weekend’s PGK Equator Tour in Sigona