Guyana’s premier male 10K athlete Cleveland `Little Kenyan’ Forde will be seeking to add Sunday’s COURTS anniversary 10K run to his tally of victories over this distance both on local soil and the regional and international levels.Speaking to Chronicle Sport recently, Forde said his chance of winning on Sunday is good, but one does not know what will happen on race day. “Every time you go out there you have to expect anyone can win,” Forde stated.
The winner of the Massy 10K run two Sunday’s ago said “once you start the race, you get the feeling of how it’s going to be…no race is ever the same every time, you have to expect anything can happen,” the holder of the men’s 1500, 3000 and 5000 metres national records stated.
Forde said he forgot to dedicate his Massy 10K victory to Amerindian Heritage Month, but come Sunday, win or loose he is going to dedicate his efforts to the Amerindian peoples of Guyana.
Forde was born in the village of Mabaruma, North West District (Region 1) 30 years ago and is of Amerindian descent.
In winning the Massy 10K race, Forde clocked 33 minutes 18 seconds but said come Sunday he expects to lower that time and he can only do this once he gets good competition and this competition he thinks could come from Cleveland Thomas who placed second in the Massy 10K two Sundays ago.
The soft spoken Forde is of the opinion that the organizers of the Courts race should look at starting the event in the afternoon on Sunday, since according to him, there are more persons who come out of their homes on Sunday afternoons to `hang’ on the seawalls and along the route the race will be run.
This Forde said might even encourage more persons to get involved in the sport as well as to start a new healthy life style.
Asked if the late start in the hot sun for the Massy 10k by anyway affected him, Forde replied in the negative saying that he preempted a late start and that was the reason why he prepared for the event during the mid morning period when the sun is really hot.
Forde, however, said while he used mid mornings to prepare, there were other athletes with work commitments and so they had to prepare for the event very early in the mornings or late in the afternoons when the place is cool.
He also opined that the organisers should look at placing the water stations closer along the route since running on the roads of Guyana in the hot sun is more exhausting than road races in North America and Europe where the conditions are very much cooler.
Forde said, also, if race organisers schedule races to start at 06:00hrs, then by all means it should start at that time and not 90 minutes later when the sun begins to get into its glory.

By Michael DaSilva