Kuwait’s athletics team pushed its medal tally to six medals on Sunday at the Arab Athletics Championships in Ismailia, adding four silvers and one bronze in a single afternoon at the Suez Canal Authority Stadium. The delegation now sits on one gold, four silver and one bronze through two days of competition at the combined Under-16 and Under-23 meet.
Farouq Al-Shaer, a board member of the Kuwait Athletics Federation and head of its media committee, broke down the Sunday results to the state news agency KUNA. His account, the four silvers and one bronze from Sunday in Ismailia, names each athlete, each event, and the mark that put them on the podium. The federation briefings do not include lane assignments, wind readings, or tactical notes.
Sunday’s Silver Surge Lifts Kuwait to Six Medals
All five medals added on Sunday came in silver or bronze. Four were silver, one was bronze. Together they extended Kuwait’s run at the championships, where the delegation had already opened its account with pole vault gold on Saturday.
The Under-16 long jump silver went to Fahad Al-Dhafiri, who reached a personal best of 6.40 meters. Talal Al-Yaqout took silver in the Under-16 100m hurdles in 13.95 seconds. Hussein Al-Tamimi added a third silver in the Under-23 shot put with a throw of 16.98 meters. All three came on the second day of a four-day meet.
The Under-23 100m hurdles delivered both of Kuwait’s remaining Sunday medals. Jassim Al-Janaei claimed silver in 14.08 seconds. Abdullah Al-Munais took bronze in the same final, finishing in 14.16 seconds. The two hurdle medals, plus Al-Tamimi’s shot put silver, completed a five-medal afternoon for the delegation. None of Sunday’s medals were gold.
| Athlete | Category | Event | Mark | Medal |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fahad Al-Dhafiri | Under-16 | Long jump | 6.40 m (personal best) | Silver |
| Talal Al-Yaqout | Under-16 | 100m hurdles | 13.95 s | Silver |
| Hussein Al-Tamimi | Under-23 | Shot put | 16.98 m | Silver |
| Jassim Al-Janaei | Under-23 | 100m hurdles | 14.08 s | Silver |
| Abdullah Al-Munais | Under-23 | 100m hurdles | 14.16 s | Bronze |
The Marks That Built the Medal Haul
The five marks span three very different events, all set on the same red track in Ismailia. Long jump, sprint hurdles, and shot put don’t share training patterns, recovery loads, or coaching specialists. They share only the federation jersey.
Al-Dhafiri’s 6.40 m was identified by Al-Shaer as a personal best. Al-Yaqout added a hurdles silver in 13.95 seconds. Al-Tamimi’s 16.98 m shot put was the third Sunday silver. All three came on the second day of a four-day meet.
Al-Janaei’s 14.08 seconds in the Under-23 hurdles was the fastest Kuwaiti time of the day. Al-Munais followed him across the line in 14.16 seconds in the same final. The bronze and silver both went to Kuwaiti runners from the same heat. Neither time carries the personal best label in the federation briefing. Only Al-Dhafiri’s 6.40 m in the long jump carries that label on Sunday.
Only Al-Dhafiri’s long jump is identified in the federation account as a personal best. The hurdles times and the shot put distance are reported without that label. Whether the other Sunday marks were also PBs isn’t in the public record from the federation briefings.
Saturday’s Pole Vault Gold Opened the Account
The Sunday surge was the second act of a campaign that opened on Saturday with pole vault gold. Mohammed Nasser cleared 3.70 meters for the Kuwaiti delegation’s first medal of the championships. Federation officials identified the mark as a personal best. His gold put Kuwait on the medal table before any other Gulf rival had landed on it.
The pole vault result set the tone for the delegation. Five medals followed it on Sunday. Six medals sit on the Kuwaiti board now, with the championships running through June 24.
- 6: Kuwait’s medal tally through two days
- 1: Gold medal (pole vault, Mohammed Nasser)
- 4: Silver medals added Sunday
- 1: Bronze medal added Sunday
- 14: Arab nations competing at Suez Canal Authority Stadium
- June 24: Final day of competition
An Inaugural Stage for Under-16 Athletes
The championships in Ismailia are a double-header. The third edition of the Arab Under-23 Athletics Championships is running alongside the inaugural Arab Under-16 Athletics Championships. It is the first time the younger age group has had its own continental stage. Organisers paired the two under a single organising committee but kept separate technical set-ups. For federations with limited senior depth, the dual structure opens a second medal pathway.
For Kuwait, the Under-16 contests produced two of the five Sunday medals. Al-Dhafiri and Al-Yaqout both climbed the podium in their age group. Both marks came in events the federation had not previously announced as target events for the meet.
Egyptian Gazette reporting on the championships frames the dual structure as a regional shift, how the combined U-16 and U-23 championship came together at Suez Canal Stadium with the Arab Athletics Federation describing the move as a step beyond previous editions. Championship director Mohamed Abu Fandi, vice-president of the Arab Athletics Federation and a board member of the Egyptian federation, cast the under-16 contest as a launchpad for future senior talent. The Under-23 program is positioned as the final test before athletes step into the senior elite tier. For Kuwait’s three Under-23 medal winners on Sunday (Al-Tamimi, Al-Janaei, and Al-Munais), the meet sits directly on that graduation line.
This is a transformational step for athletics across the region.
Fourteen Nations at Suez Canal Stadium
Fourteen Arab nations are competing across both age groups in Ismailia. Egypt fields the largest delegation as host. Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Libya, Kuwait, Yemen, Bahrain, Oman, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Iraq, and Djibouti round out the field.
The championships are running under the supervision of Egypt’s Ministry of Youth and Sports. The venue is the Suez Canal Authority Stadium in Ismailia. The stadium sits in a coastal city on the canal that hosted the previous Arab Under-23 edition in 2024. The meet runs from June 20 to 24. Both age groups share the venue but compete under separate technical setups.
Egypt’s junior program has been the regional reference point. Egyptian Gazette reporting noted that the country’s under-20 athletes finished the 21st Arab Championships in Tunisia second in the medal table with 18 medals, including nine gold, six silver, and three bronze. The Under-23 program running in Ismailia this week is the next layer of that pipeline. Kuwaiti athletes are competing directly against the host’s emerging cohort.
The Under-16 contests drew wide participation from across the Arab world. Organisers framed the younger category as a foundation for identifying regional talent before athletes graduate to the senior ranks. The inaugural edition is the test of whether that foundation holds across fourteen national federations at once.
The list of participating nations reads like a roll call of the Arab world’s track-and-field programs. Five of the fourteen delegations are from the Gulf: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen. The other nine come from North Africa, the Levant, and the Horn of Africa. Kuwait’s delegation is one of the smaller Gulf squads in Ismailia.
The 14 Arab nations at the Arab Athletics Championships in Ismailia:
- Egypt (host)
- Tunisia
- Algeria
- Morocco
- Libya
- Kuwait
- Yemen
- Bahrain
- Oman
- Syria
- Saudi Arabia
- Lebanon
- Iraq
- Djibouti
The Federation Voice Behind the Numbers
The day-by-day readouts from Kuwait’s camp come from Farouq Al-Shaer. He sits on the board of the Kuwait Athletics Federation and heads its media committee. His updates to KUNA, the Kuwaiti state news agency, are the primary public record of the delegation’s medal haul at the championships.
Al-Shaer has spoken after each session since the meet began on Saturday. His bulletins are the only federation voice quoted by name on the public record. His briefings name each athlete, event, category, and the mark they produced. They do not include rankings, lane assignments, or wind readings. They are a results bulletin, not a tactical breakdown.
Gulf athletics federations have historically operated with limited public-facing media infrastructure. The Kuwaiti delegation’s approach in Ismailia, naming marks and personal bests through a single federation spokesperson, mirrors the pattern other Gulf delegations have used at recent Arab championships. That includes Oman’s campaign at the 24th Arab Athletics Championship in Algeria in 2025, which ran on similar bulletin-style messaging. Oman’s setup there was framed as a regional visibility test rather than a medal target by federation officials.
Kuwait’s Ismailia trip runs on the same kind of footprint. The delegation isn’t the region’s largest in headcount. The bulletins report what Kuwaiti athletes did on the day. What rival delegations did on the same day is not in Al-Shaer’s briefings. The numbers he puts out are Kuwait’s numbers, full stop.
Final Days in Ismailia
The championships run through June 24. Sunday’s results are in the record. The remaining event calendar will determine whether Kuwait adds to its six-medal tally before the meet closes. The Under-16 and Under-23 event schedules both run into the closing days.
The Under-16 long jump and hurdles have already delivered two Kuwaiti silvers. The Under-23 shot put and hurdles have delivered three more medals. Pole vault gold from Saturday was the delegation’s first result. Medals through the rest of the meet will come from new events, new athletes, and new marks. None of those have been previewed in the federation briefings to date.
