Mike Honcho wrote:
The King....really..? Of what. Age cheats? Give me a break, this guy without a doubt is at least 22-23. By the time he's a senior he'll be 26 or so. These Kenyans and most easy Africans have no confirmed date. For the most part, they don't even have "legit" birth certificates. That being said, I've seen him and ran against him. There is no way, he is 18-19 years as you claim. And, if you partied with Henry, you should still be partying with him and off these boards!
Kenyans might lie to the world about their age, but they don't lie to each other. Edward is on record as having run age group competitions as far back as age 15. In-country, Kenyans take age cheating very seriously, too the point where athletes and coaches have been nearly beaten to death at a track meet when someone was suspected of age cheating.
Edward was not some athlete training with a pro group who came from out of nowhere to win world juniors, signs with an agent and the following week is racing in DL meets. Edward was a grade school student in a U.S. run orphanage who came to the U.S. to go to school. What was his incentive to lie about his age? No kid would want to have their age back dated and have to repeat grades. Myself and most people who know his story are pretty certain he is the age he says he is, but certainly he is nowhere near the age people joke about. Besides, age cheating is about gaming the system for running glory and money, Ed has never competed in age restricted competitions such as world youth or juniors, in fact, he as not even attempted to get NCAA freshman records. He hasn't even talked about a career as a runner...as far as I can tell his primary focus has been on getting an education.
This is coming from someone who has written extensively about the Kenyan age cheating problem, which by the way, this problem also exist in other 3rd world countries namely Cuba.