Kim McDonald: A Life for Running
In 1984 Kim McDonald established Kim McDonald International
Management (KIM). The Londoner, who died in 2001 at the age of 45,
managed some of the world’s best athletes. Additionally he worked as a
coach and was one of the closest consultants of IAAF President Lamine
Diack. In international athletics Kim McDonald was one of the most
distinguished agents. Kim McDonald left a daughter, Bridget.
Kim McDonald preferred a quiet and restrained style of working. Despite
his success he preferred to remain in the background. The former
runner, who had a personal best at 3,000 m of 7:56 minutes, recognized
the potential of Kenyan runners already at the end of the 70ies. At
that time he was in a training camp in Africa. Due to a heel injury he
had to end his sporting career in 1985. A year before he had founded
Kim McDonald International Management (KIM) with his partner Duncan
Gaskell. Kim McDonald was one of the first who realized the importance
of the management aspect in modern athletics.
In nearly 20 years as an agent Kim McDonald managed almost exclusively
runners. „On the one hand side I have enough to do with that, and on
the other hand it is distance running I know a lot about”, he once
explained. The list of his former athletes looks like a ‘Who is Who’ in
distance running: Steve Ovett, John Walker, Grete Waitz, Uta Pippig,
Sonia O’Sullivan as well as the Kenyans Moses Kiptanui, Daniel Komen or
Noah Ngeny were among them. Some of them he didn’t only managed; he
also coached some to the top runners of the world. In 2000 Noah Ngeny
won the Olympic 1,500 m final in front of Hicham El Guerrouj (Morocco).
Ngeny became a hero in Kenya.
“Kim had taken over my training plan in the mid 80ies. I owe him my
Olympic silver medal and my victory at the Commonwealth Games”, former
British middle distance runner Peter Elliott said. “He brought me up
from a nobody to where I am today. My whole success I owe to him. He
was a father figure for me. I will miss him a lot“, Noah Ngeny said
after Kim McDonald’s death.
Mike Boit, the former Kenyan world class runner who was later an
official, asked Kim McDonald in 1990 for help to support Kenyan
talents. Since that time he travelled about six times a year to Africa.
Kim McDonald established training centres in Kenya, London, Melbourne
and Stanford (USA). Almost two third of his roughly 120 athletes came
from Kenya. Kim McDonald’s politics was to let the runners have a
certain freedom. He never contracted his athletes. Additionally the
Londoner was a much demanded partner for running organizations like the
Boston Marathon and partly the Berlin Marathon.
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