 Yego in 2015 | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
Nickname | Mr. YouTube |
| Born | (1989-01-04)January 4, 1989 (age 36) Cheptonon,Rift Valley Province, Kenya (todayNandi County) |
| Height | 175 cm (5 ft 9 in) |
| Weight | 85 kg (187 lb) |
| Sport | |
| Country |  Kenya |
| Sport | Track and field |
Event | Javelin throw |
| Coached by | Petteri Piironen[1] |
| Achievements and titles | |
| Personalbests | AR 92.72m (2015) |
Medal record | |
Julius Yego (born 4 January 1989) is a Kenyantrack and field athlete who competes in thejavelin throw. Nicknamed "Mr. YouTube" because he learned how to throw by watchingYouTube videos of javelin athletes, Yego is theAfrican record holder for the event with a personal best of 92.72m.
He won the javelin title at theAll-Africa Games in 2011 and at theAfrican Championships in Athletics in 2012 and 2014; at the2013 World Championships he placed fourth, losing a medal in the final round. In 2014, he became the first Kenyan to win aCommonwealth Games gold medal in a field event. At the2015 World Championships he won the gold medal with a throw of 92.72m, becoming the first Kenyan to win a World Championships gold medal in a field event. He won silver at the2016 Summer Olympics inRio de Janeiro.
Yego was born inCheptonon (Soba River) location inTinderet,Nandi District. He attended high school at Kapsabet Boys High School.[2]
Yego became interested in the javelin throw as a youth and later he watched videos of athletes such asJan Železný andAndreas Thorkildsen onYouTube to help with his technique and to learn how to train at a gym.[3][4] He competed in the high school regional championships in 2003. In 2006 he won the national junior title and broke the Kenyan junior record with a throw of 67 metres. More renowned for distance runners, Yego quickly ascended to the top of the Kenyan scene.[4] He won his first national title in the javelin at the age of nineteen in 2008 and defended it in both 2009 and 2010.[5]
He earned his first national call up in 2010 and threw a personal best of 74.51 m to take thebronze medal at the2010 African Championships in Athletics, which was held inNairobi.[6] He improved his best to 75.44 m at the Kenyan Commonwealth trials.[7] He travelled toNew Delhi for the2010 Commonwealth Games and ended the competition in seventh place with a best throw of 69.60 m. In 2011 he still did not have a throwing coach, due to the lack of popularity of the event in Kenya. Despite this, he won a fourth straight Kenyan title then went to the2011 All-Africa Games and became Kenya's first ever champion in the event, throwing aKenyan national record mark of 78.34 m.[3] This betteredPaul Lagat's fourteen-year-old national record (78.20 m). In respect of this achievement theIAAF (the sport's governing body) gave Yego a six-month scholarship to train alongside elite javelin coaches in Europe, with the aim of preparing him for the2012 London Olympics.[8]
After two months of training at the IAAF-accredited centre inKuortane, Finland, Yego returned to Kenya in April 2012 and threw a new record of 79.95 m. This was within the Olympic "B" standard for the event and gained him the prospect of becoming the first Kenyan person to compete in the javelin at the Olympics.[9] He improved the Kenyan record atFinnish Elite Games Series event inKuortane on 22 July 2012, Finland throwing 81.12 metres[10] During theLondon 2012 Olympics qualifying round, he broke his own national record by 69 cm, to make it 81.81 m. That throw was enough to send him into the final, where he placed 12th.
At the2013 World Championships inMoscow Yego placed fourth, improving his Kenyan record by more than three metres to 85.40 m. He was the first Kenyan ever to qualify for a field event final at the World Championships, and was in bronze medal position until Russia'sDmitriy Tarabin passed him on his last throw.[11]Track & Field News ranked Yego fifth in the world that year, the first time he'd been ranked in the top 10.[12]
Yego won the javelin at the2014 Commonwealth Games, beating the reigning Olympic champion,Keshorn Walcott, with a distance of 83.87 m.[13] Yego was the first Kenyan athlete to win a Commonwealth title in a field event.[14] He won a second gold later that summer at theAfrican Championships, throwing a season best 84.72 m and defeating world leaderIhab Abdelrahman El-Sayed of Egypt.[15]
Yego continued his rise in 2015, winning theOstrava Golden Spike javelin on 26 May with a new Kenyan record of 86.88 m after his best throw was not flagged as a foul by the judges even though his hand touched the line.[16] On 4 June he improved to 87.71 m at theGolden Gala in Rome, placing second behindVítězslav Veselý. Three days later, Yego won at theBritish Grand Prix inBirmingham, overtaking Veselý in the last round with a massive throw of 91.39 m; the throw was originally ruled a narrowsector foul, but after his coach requested a remeasurement of the sector angle, the original sector was found to not have been wide enough and the ruling was overturned. Yego's throw was a newAfrican record, and the best in the world since 2006.[17][18] On 26 August Yego won the gold medal at 2015 World Championships with a throw of 92.72m.[19]At the2016 Summer Olympics inRio de Janeiro, Yego won silver with a throw of 88.24 m, despite only throwing once after picking up a right ankle injury.
1No mark in the final
Yego is married to Sincy Chemutai.[20] They have two sons, Jarvis and Finn.[21]
| Records | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Men's Javelin African Record Holder 7 June 2015 – present | Incumbent |
|
African Champions in men'sjavelin throw | |
|---|---|
|
Commonwealth Games champions in men'sjavelin throw | |
|---|---|
|
