When Dr. Joseph Kithitu talks about travel, he does not sound like a man discussing leisure. He sounds like a strategist staring at a balance sheet.
As the chairman of the Kenya Association of Travel Agents (KATA), he believes Kenyan travel agents are sitting on a goldmine they have barely begun to mine: sports tourism.
His message to the industry is blunt.
“Wake up and cash in,” he says.
“To monetise what we do is not optional; it is essential. Nobody wakes up every morning not to make money.”
And the numbers suggest he may be right.
Globally, sports tourism, travel driven by participation in or attendance at sporting events, is one of the fastest-growing segments in the travel economy. The sector is already valued at more than US$600 billion and is projected to surge to nearly US$1.7 trillion by 2032. Nearly 44 per cent of sports fans travel internationally to attend events, and the typical sports tourist spends US$1,500 or more per trip, often staying longer and spending more than traditional leisure travellers.
Yet Kenya, despite its reputation as a sporting powerhouse, captures only a fraction of that value.
In 2024, Kenya’s tourism sector generated roughly Sh452 billion, representing strong growth from the previous year. But the bulk of that revenue came from safaris, beaches, and business travel. Sports tourism remains largely underdeveloped, an irony for a country that dominates global distance running and hosts internationally recognised sporting events.
Dr. Kithitu points to a striking comparison. Cities such as Houston in the United States generated more than US$330 million in economic impact from a handful of sporting events in 2024. In Northern Ireland, a single international golf championship injected around £280 million (about US$369 million) into the local economy.
“Those numbers should make us pause,” he says. “If other destinations can do it, why can’t the land of marathon champions lead in sports tourism?”
Kenya already has the raw ingredients.
The annual Safari Rally Kenya attracts hundreds of thousands of spectators and global media coverage, filling hotels across Naivasha and the Rift Valley. The Nairobi City Marathon draws international runners and has injected hundreds of millions of shillings into the local economy while raising more than Sh850 million for community programmes.
But Dr. Kithitu argues that the real opportunity lies beyond the events themselves.
“Too many visitors come for the race or the rally and leave the next day,” he says. “If someone travels halfway across the world to run a marathon and leaves without seeing Kenya, we have lost a huge opportunity.”
He often illustrates this point with a story from Kenya’s coast.
At the lush fairways of Vipingo Ridge, he says, golfers sometimes find themselves sharing the course with wildlife.
“You hit your golf ball and a zebra casually walks over, nudges it with its nose and sends it rolling back to you,” he jokes. “Where else in the world does that happen?”
Moments like that, he argues, are exactly what modern travellers crave — authentic, unpredictable, unforgettable experiences that turn a sporting trip into a story worth sharing.
A typical international sports visitor can easily spend US$1,500 toUS$2,000 on flights, accommodation, and race participation alone. Extend that stay by just three or four days, with excursions to the Maasai Mara, Lake Naivasha, or training runs in the high-altitude town of Iten, where champions such as Eliud Kipchoge have trained, and that figure can double.
Multiply that by thousands of visitors attending major events each year, and the economic potential becomes significant.
For Dr. Kithitu, the implication is clear: travel agents must shift from selling tickets to designing experiences.
“The event is the hook,” he says. “The experience is the product.”
He envisions travel packages that combine race participation with cultural tours, safaris, high-altitude training experiences, and culinary explorations, turning a sporting event into a week-long Kenyan journey.
If even 300,000 visitors annually travelled to Kenya specifically for sports tourism and each spent an average of US$2,500, the country could generate roughly US$750 million, close to Sh100 billion, in new tourism revenue each year.
That, Dr. Kithitu argues, is a conservative estimate.
With deliberate planning, stronger partnerships between government, event organisers, and travel agencies, and smarter packaging of experiences, Kenya could emerge as Africa’s leading sports tourism destination.
“We already have the athletes, the events, and the landscapes,” he says.
“What we need now is to turn that advantage into business.”
For Kenya’s travel agents, the race has already begun. The only question, is who will choose to run it.
