Rwanda’s long distance athlete Dieudonne Disi will face a field of World-class runners in the first annual RAK International Half Marathon this Friday in Dubai.

Disi who displayed a poor show in the Puerto Rico half marathon race,finishing fifth over the weekend will compete for a prize bonanza in excess of $ 155,000(Frw. 86.1 millions) ,officially the World’s richest half marathon.

The 5000m, 10000m and half marathon national record holder clocked 1 :05,coming behind race winners, Kenyan Kimtai Kiprono, Ethiopian Gelete Burka, Kenyan internationals James Barusi and John Kosgei respectively.

Disi who left for Dubai on Wednesday told Times Sport that he had put the Puerto Rico half marathon past him. ‘I did not hit my target in Puerto Rico and i’m moving on. I’m now focusing on the Dubai half marathon,’ Disi said. Disi who will be racing for the first prize money of $ 20000 will face stiff challenge from Kenya’s Paul Kosgei who has a world class personal best of 59 :07. He won the 25km race of Britain in a world record time of 1 :12 :45 before winning the Berlin Half Marathon with the second fastest time ever last year.

Another top star in this race is Aleksey Sokolov of Russia who won last year’s Dublin City Marathon, Ireland and created a new record, finishing in a time of 2:11:30, only 89 seconds outside of the 2004 record held by Lezan Kimutai and has won the 30K Russian Road Race Championships for 4 years in a row.

Recent gold medalist at the Doha Asian Games in the 10,000m race, Hasan Mahboob will join Kosgei, Kibiwott, Sokolov and 36 other elite international athletes in the Dubai event.

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