He made his marathon debut in 2005, competing at the New York City Marathon, but he did not manage to finish the distance on his first attempt.[4] He made his mark in the senior ranks in 2006: he came second at the City-Pier-City Half Marathon behind Moses Kipkosgei Kigen,[5] and then finished in third place in the Rotterdam Half Marathon, setting a new best of 1:00:13 for the distance.[6] A month later he won the Amsterdam Marathon title in a time of 2:08:52.[4] He took part in the Lagos Half Marathon in December and beat Francis Kibiwott to win the race with a sprint finish. His time of 1:03:18 was a minute off Fabiano Joseph's course record, but an organisational error meant runners had to fight through a traffic jam at the 14 km mark.[7]
He ran at the prestigious RAK Half Marathon in 2007, but managed only tenth place.[8] He was tenth in the Dublin Marathon in 2009, and ninth at the 2010 Prague Marathon. He recorded a new personal best at the Košice Peace Marathon later that year by finishing in a time of 2:08:40, which brought him second place some seven seconds behind race winner Gilbert Chepkwony. Both runners comfortably improved the Slovakian all-comers record by over a minute, a mark set by William Biama at the competition three years earlier.[9] He ended the year with a third-place finish at the Honolulu Marathon.[10] He ran two marathons in 2011: he had a win at the Milano City Marathon in hot conditions in April, but finished the podium in fourth at the Shanghai Marathon in December.[11]
