Kenyan mess in Rio costs IMG trainee Carvin Nkanata his Olympic shot
Carvin Nkanata, who has trained at IMG Academy since graduating from Pittsburgh in 2014, has been ruled out of the 2016 Summer Olympics. The South Carolina native has represented Kenya, his father’s home country, since 2012, but went to Rio de Janeiro without a Kenyan passport. International Olympic Committee guidelines require athletes to possess a passport from the country he or she is representing at the Summer Olympics.
“It’s basically been Olympic preparation since I got down here,” Nkanta said last month in Bradenton before departing for Rio.
Nkanata holds the Kenyan record in the 200-meter dash at 20.14 seconds and was slated to compete in the event Aug. 16 in Brazil. Teammate Mike Mokamba will be the lone Kenyan competitor in the 200 dash. Stephen Soi, the head of mission for the National Olympic Committee of Kenya (NOCK), confirmed Nkanata’s absence to Kenyan reporters in Rio, and then hurled blame at Athletics Kenya (AK).
“Athletics Kenya should have known better when they were selecting Nkanata to compete in the Olympics,” Soi told The Standard, a Kenyan newspaper in Nairobi. “They should have ensured that he had a Kenyan passport as IOC cannot allow you to compete for a country when you don’t have their passport.”
Nkanata arrived in Rio on Thursday and, according to The Standard, was denied entry from the Olympic Village due to invalid documentation. Nkanata travels with an American passport and possesses a Kenyan identification card. NOCK has not publicly expressed a desire to appeal the decision, which prompted Nkanata to break his silence via Twitter on Monday.
..it's funny how there is an appeals process... But individuals rather take the easy way out then fight. #nobodyhelps
— Carvin Nkanata (@CarvinNkanata) August 8, 2016
Nkanata has competed in four international events for Kenya, plus the recently completed Olympic trials in Eldoret. In 2014, he earned a bronze medal for Kenya in the 200 at the African Championship in Athletics.
AK refuted Soi’s claims in a series of tweets sent out Monday.
1:Our mandate is only to prepare athletes & hand them to NOCK for the Training Camp, travel, accommodation & competition in host countries
— Athletics Kenya (AK) (@athletics_kenya) August 8, 2016
1: Any confusion as we have seen with athletes travel is solely a mistake of NOCK. @moscakenya @MichKatami @MutwiriMutuota @SaddiqueShaban
— Athletics Kenya (AK) (@athletics_kenya) August 8, 2016
5: we sent @CarvinNkanata papers among others, to NOCK for accreditation 29th February,2016
— Athletics Kenya (AK) (@athletics_kenya) August 8, 2016
5: NOCK has had @CarvinNkanata papers since March, reconfirmed his travel and received his accreditation or lack of it.
— Athletics Kenya (AK) (@athletics_kenya) August 8, 2016
Nkanata’s disqualification is just one of the mishaps that have plagued an extraordinarily messy start to the Olympics for Kenya and its athletics program. Julius Yego, a world-champion in the javelin, was held up at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on Sunday when his ticket to Rio went missing. The group of Kenyan athletes slated to fly to Brazil with Yego boycotted their flight until his travel plans were eventually straightened out.
Two days earlier, Yego expressed frustration with NOCK in a Facebook post after he was informed his coach would not travel with him to the Olympics and instead meet him the day before he took the field.
“Is someone really trying to sabotage the results of team Kenya at Rio!!” he wrote. “Am reading mischieve (sic) on how the management of the team is being run, the sprinters left last Saturday and their coaches were left behind, very irresponsible and funny.”
The same day, The Sunday Times in England and ARD in Germany reported AK manager Michael Rotich was being sent home amid an investigation into bribery over drug testing. Rotich was filmed demanding 10,000 pounds in exchange for warning a British coach about upcoming drug tests.
The footage is featured in a video on the ARD website. The report is in German, but the Rotich’s damning admission begins at 2:23.
Nkanata’s rise to Olympic status has been rapid and unlikely. The 25-year-old didn’t start running tack until his junior year at Summersville and then spent two years as a junior college sprinter at Butler Community College in Kansas and Iowa Central Community College before transferring to Pitt for his final two years of college. As a senior, Nkanata finished third in the 200 at the indoor national championship and temporarily held the national lead with an outdoor sprint of 20.17 before coming up short of the finals at the end of the season.
“If I look back now, I would have never, never thought about it. Olympics wasn’t even in my eyesight,” Nkanata said with a laugh after a practice at IMG in July. “I didn’t know anything about running, and to this point now, fast forward seven years now, it’s just crazy, man.”
This story was originally published August 8, 2016 at 10:45 PM with the headline "Kenyan mess in Rio costs IMG trainee Carvin Nkanata his Olympic shot."