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December 2009
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Klüft makes humanitarian visit to Ethiopia |
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20.11.2008 |
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| Kluft in Beijing 2008
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Swedish superstar and
two-time Waterford Crystal European Athlete of the Year Carolina Klüft has
taken time out from her winter training to pay a quick trip to Ethiopia and
support local humanitarian projects.
Earlier this week, Klüft
visited a scheme supported by the World Food Programme just outside the
Ethiopian capital Addis Adaba which tries to help increase food production in
predominantly rural communities traumatised by six serious droughts in the last
20 years.
"I have great memories of my first visit here in
2006 and have wanted to come back ever since. The people are so friendly here,
and I wanted to learn more about development issues in Ethiopia,"
commented Klüft.
She will also be going to the northern Ethiopian
city of Axum, in the Tigray province which is the home of many leading
Ethiopian runners, to visit a project of the United Nations Development
Programme close to the Ethiopian-Eritrean border which is aimed at removing
land mines, a tragic relic of the various wars that have been conducted in the
area in recent decades.
Klüft is stopping over in Ethiopia on her way to South
Africa for a spell of sunshine and warm weather training. "It's pretty
drab in Sweden at the moment," she joked.
Despite the recent diagnosis of a seemingly alarming stress
fracture in one of her shin bones, Klüft remains optimistic that she will be
able to compete indoors from the start of next year.
"It's a very unusual injury. My lower leg hurt during
the summer, but we treated it with ice and it went away. We had no idea it was
something more serious," said Klüft.
"But I've been able to continue some
running and gym training and I'm aiming to start competing indoors either in
late January or February."
Her coach, Agerbjer Bergvall, added:
"She can't do any jumps training but we are pushing hard with running and
strength training."
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Always able to see the bigger picture and show
a human side
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As part of her running regime, Klüft will have a
relatively gentle outing over a few kilometres on Saturday, competing alongside
thousands of Ethiopian school children.
The event is a prelude to the TOYOTA Great
Ethiopian Run over 10km the following day, which sees Britain's Mo Farah and
Sweden's Mustafa Mohamed lead the European challenge as part of their
preparations to be among the main medal contenders at the 2008 SPAR European
Cross Country Championships in Brussels on December 14.
"When I was here two years ago it was great
to see the children's competitive spirit. With everyone running in the same
T-shirt, I can't wait to see it again this weekend," reflected Klüft.
Notwithstanding her trip to Africa,
the last year has been an unusual one for the three-time heptathlon World
champion, who also took gold medals in the seven-discipline event at the 2002
and 2006 European Athletics Championships.
Rather than defend her 2004 Olympic heptathlon
title, she chose to concentrate on the long and triple jump in 2008. The switch
of emphasis brought mixed results with her getting a national record in the
latter event but failing to get an Olympic medal in the long jump.
Klüft has yet to publicly confirm whether she
will make a return to the multi-events or continue to concentrate on the
horizontal jumps.
In addition to all her outdoor exploits at the
heptathlon - she is unbeaten in 19 competitions stretching back to 2001 - she
is also the 2005 and 2007 European Athletics Indoor Championships pentathlon
gold medallists and unbeaten under cover in the event since 2002.
However, whether she's running, jumping or
throwing next year, Klüft did not rule out an appearance at the 2009 European
Athletics Indoor Championships subject to a full recovery from her stress
fracture.
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