Kenya's team of 13 Paralympics competitors and five running guides will leave the country later Thursday for Beijing to take part in the Sept. 6-17 Paralympics Games.

The overall team coach, James Voga, said the athletes were ready for the big challenge in Beijing.

"I expect the athletes to win more medals for Kenya than the Olympic team that arrived on Wednesday night," Voga, an American national, was quoted as saying by the Daily Nation.

"We did it in Athens, we are capable of doing it again."

Voga has spent a fortnight with the team. He is in the country for the first time, although his association with the team went back to the 2000 Sydney Paralympics. At the time, he was a coach of the U.S. team.

"When I saw Henry Wanyoike training at the Olympics Village in Sydney, I told my athletes and other coaches that he was going to take the gold medal in the 10,000 meters," said Voga. "At the time no one knew Wanyoike."

The contingent consists of 2004 Paralympics 10,000 and 5,000m gold medallist and world record holder Henry Wanyoike, the 2002 paraplegic games Javelin gold medallist Mary Nakhumicha.

Also featuring on the athletics list are Nelly Munyalo who earned a bronze medal in the 2006 Netherlands Paraplegic Games, and Abraham Tarbet who won a gold medal in the 2007 All African Games held in Algiers.

Wanyoike, the captain of the Kenyan team, said they hope to emulate their counterparts who bagged a total of 14 medals at the just concluded Beijing Olympics.

Wanyoike said he had an uphill task to register good results in Beijing this time round as he would be competing in three disciplines namely 5,000m, 10,000m and the marathon.

Chairman of the Kenya Paralympics team Douglas Sidialo said last week that he was confident that the 13 competitors will deliver because of their past record, adding that government and corporate support would spur them on.

(Xinhua News Agency August 29, 2008)