Celebrated Athletics coach John Velzian rests at 93

The celebrated athletics coach John Velzian has rested at the age of 93 years while undergoing treatment at the MP Shah Hospital, Nairobi.

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This is according to Elizabeth Anono, The African Athletics Development Centre (AADC) secretary, who confirmed his death saying the tactician was found unconscious and lying in his bedroom by the house help on Wednesday morning and thereafter rushed to MP Shah hospital where he had his last breath on Thursday midnight.

“The doctors from the hospital called the house help on Thursday morning indicating that the old man had passed on,” said Anono, who celebrated Velzian, a former director at AADC as the father of athletics in the country.
“In our lives, there have been few people as special as John Velzian. He was someone that we felt deeply connected to, and even though he is gone, we feel his presence throughout our region,” said Anono.
She further termed him as a passionate coach who ensured athletics development is promoted in each member country within the scope of African athletics in English-speaking countries.
Velzian was a former coach and administrator who was from British but made his life in Kenya. He had a huge impact during his 60-year career in athletics, particularly in Africa.
After becoming a physical education officer for Kenya in 1958, he remained following the country’s independence in 1963 to develop the nation’s athletics talent, particularly in long-distance running. It was around that period that he discovered and began working with athletes such as the great Kip Keino, who would go on to win Olympic titles at the 1968 and 1972 Games.
“I first met him in 1962 when he was coaching in Nyeri,” Keino said in a statement.

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“He was very thorough in his coaching under the old British system and helped me to become the top athlete in the world.”
Athletics Kenya president Jack Tuwei also paid tribute to the late Velzian.

Athletics Kenya president Jack Tuwei

“I think nobody in our current environment can match his contributions to the development of athletics in our country and Africa,” said Tuwei, adding that they were in the process of finding more details about Velzian’s death
Velzian was Kenya’s first national athletics team head coach and went on to become a long-time director of the global governing body’s Regional Development Centre in Kenya. He played a key role in the bid and organization of the 2007 World Athletics Cross Country Championships in Mombasa and had been the race director for the Nairobi Marathon.
In 2011 he received the coaching lifetime achievement award from the world governing body in recognition of all he had done for the sport.
He remained active until he was well into his 90s and died in Nairobi just a few weeks shy of his 94th birthday.