Seyfu's story: Run every day and don't give up

Journey to Centrepoint

Seyfu, now 24, came to Centrepoint after fleeing Ethiopia and arriving in the UK as an asylum seeker when he was 17. His passage to safety was challenging, arriving in France before coming over to the UK and moving into a shared house in London with others who had made a similar journey.  

“I came from France and then I came to England. I don’t know where it was, but they took me and three other people to live in a house together in London. We were living together in a shared house.”

However, after 4 years, the house was no longer safe to live in and Seyfu and the other residents were made to leave. He explained his situation to his social worker at the time, who made the relevant referrals for him to be moved to a Centrepoint supported home. Before too long, Seyfu was able to move into a new room in the shared home, where he has been staying ever since.

“I lived there for four or five years and then they said the building wasn’t safe so everyone had to go out of the building. My social worker called me to say that we need to move out of the building. And then after I moved here to Centrepoint – my social worker brought me here.”

Finding running

Before coming to the UK, Seyfu had had limited experience of running but was struck by how many people he saw doing activities like Parkrun in the local community. When he arrived in England, he didn’t speak that much English but was interested in finding ways to meet new people, integrate into a community and practice his skills whilst also getting to exercise and spend time outdoors. With that in mind, he signed himself up for his local club and that was how he started his journey with running.

After taking part in community running clubs for a few years and building up his stamina, he could see that he had become a lot faster than the other people in the group and began to enter competitions and races to see how he might fare. After he ran one of his best times during a race, he placed in the top 10 in England and was scouted to join the training group for Team GB. After continuing to compete and place highly in national and international competitions, Seyfu was selected to join the 2028 Olympics squad, set to run in the marathon.

“I started running in 2018. When I came to this country, I didn’t know how to speak the language. I saw people running at Parkrun and I tried to find a team.” 

“After I started running, like two or three years later, I became a lot faster. And then I came top ten in England. Now I’m running professionally and doing full time training which is really hard. This is my life!”

Training for the Olympics

With Seyfu continuing to place highly or winning every race he takes part in, he has been thrown headfirst into training to prep him for the upcoming Olympics in LA. Taking the time to train for the marathon carves out a huge amount of his time, with him not only running during his training but making sure to run every morning to keep him in shape – culminating in over 200km run per week! 

“Because I’m running, I am in full-time training for the marathon. Every morning I’m running. My training is really hard. I’m training for the Olympics; I’m racing at around 2 hours 16 minutes. A half marathon 1 hour 3 minutes. Yeah, it’s not too bad.” 

“I’m running like 200km a week. Each morning I’m running 20km and then 10km and then 13km every day – I do training like that which is really hard.”

On top of his training, Seyfu is also regularly competing in races around not only the UK but also the world to gain experience, try out his skills and get the opportunity to meet other athletes. Being able to test out different race lengths helps him to build up his strength to prepare for longer distance running.

“Every three weeks, or two weeks I do a race over the summer. In October I’ll go to Valencia for a half marathon and then in December I’ll be back for a marathon. I’ll be in Berlin for a half marathon. There’s always something in England every week I’ll do a 5000m race or a 10,000m race or a half-marathon.”

On top of being a full-time professional athlete for Team GB, Seyfu also works part-time at a bakery and is attending college to get his ESOL qualifications, having to balance his training, college and working to make sure he can dedicate enough time to each.

“I’m also working part-time. I started a job around a month ago – one month in training and I’m starting this week. I’m working in a bakery. It’s a nice job because it’s easy for me. I can make my hands more really fast so it’s not really that difficult for me.”

When speaking with Seyfu, he was prepping for the Great North Run where he was hoping to match his results from the previous year.

“Last year I came number 8 for all world athletes. It’s a big race and I placed as the second British athlete. There are 65,000 people doing the race, it’s a big race. I go there on Sunday do the race and then I’ll come back that Sunday afternoon.”

After being so successful with his running career, he is constantly striving to outdo himself and win every medal and race that he can. He even won the Brighton Half Marathon in 2025 and set a new men's record! 

When thinking about what brings him joy and what motivates him to continue on with his training, he was firm that it was “winning trophies and winning my races. A lot of the time I’m going to win my race. Because I’m a world athlete and an Olympic athlete a lot of the time I might come third, fourth or fifth but a lot of the time I am a winner of a half marathon or a 10K or 5K. I like my medals, and I have maybe 100 or 200 medals at home”.

Centrepoint support

Whilst living with Centrepoint, Seyfu has been able to receive support to help with his training, as well as with his qualifications at college, getting advice and support from his key workers on moving on and living independently. Together, they have been helping him to develop vital skills that he can take with him, getting the opportunity to contribute to resident’s meetings and manage his very busy schedule. The combination of support with his personal and professional has been really important to Seyfu for his development.

“If you need something, I’m asking the people here and they have really helped me with everything. Sometimes I go for a community meeting but because I’m really busy I can’t always go. There are good people working here.”

“I like it here. This house is good and the people working here are nice. I don’t ever have any problems.” 

Seyfu has been able to access support through the refugee bursary, and was granted financial support to help cover the cost of travel to and from college so that he can gain his qualification. Alongside covering the cost of this travel, he was also able to access funding to buy a few items to help support with his learning.  

Thinking to the future

With the Olympics on the horizon for Seyfu, he’s thinking about what he needs to get him there. Because of his busy schedule, he’s not been able to train with the other British athletes who go to Kenya to practice at high altitudes and in different conditions. He’s found training on the hard concrete London pavements hard and is always on the look out for softer grounds for him to tread near where he lives.

“I’m really busy – the British athletes are training in Kenya, and I am too busy to be going there. I don’t have the time! I’m working and I have college, and I don’t have the time. They are going there for a month or two months and coming back stronger because running in London is really hard. Running on grass is much better because the ground in London is so hard.”

He’s already prepping for sharing his story with reporters at the end of races, and has had experience of finishing a marathon and finding a microphone being handed to him! Whilst sharing his story, he mentioned that he might value some additional English classes to give him a bit more confidence in those situations and his key worker has been able to get him the relevant support he needs.

“I need to practice my English – this is really hard for me. Talking after you finish a race and doing an interview is really hard. I need to focus my English and get better at interviews.”

Seyfu is currently in the process of bidding on his own property and ready to move onto living independently. The timeline for him moving out has taken longer than he expected, which is making him feel a bit under pressure, but he’s looking forward to having his own space soon. 

“It’s a little difficult waiting for a house and I want to move out of this house, so I think about that a lot.”

Advice for up and coming athletes

Seyfu is often asked about his regime by fellow athletes, passers by and journalists to understand more about what they can do to be able to achieve what he has. He has some clear advice which has helped him get to where he is now and has meant that he can reach his own goals of becoming an Olympic athlete.

“Run every day – don’t give up. Keep everything up. Keep doing the exercise – going to the gym and get stronger at the gym. Keep training everyday and your body will become stronger. Start doing it one day and then the next day do something different. For me I only started a few years ago and now everyday I’m running. You keep training every day, focus, training and doing right – coming back stronger.”

We are so proud of what Seyfu has been able to achieve and how far he has come in the few years he has been training – he’s really put his all into achieving his Olympic dreams! We wish him all the best for his future races and can’t wait to cheer him on at every step.