Kiprotich sends warning to title pretenders
Kiprotich races to the finish line of the Tokyo Marathon on Sunday morning. PHOTO BY AFP
What you need to know:
Getting better. In August, Kiprotich will travel to Beijing to defend his World Championships marathon title. Those with designs on the king’s crown should now know they won’t get it easily following the Ugandan’s huge improvement.
World and Olympic champion Stephen Kiprotich did not touch gold in finishing second at the Tokyo Marathon on Sunday; and was hardly over the moon despite making his first podium finish a World Marathon Majors (WMM) event in five attempts.
“For me, it’s more about winning races than times,” he told AFP news agency shortly after crossing the Tokyo Big Sight finish-line in two hours, six minutes and 33 seconds – his new personal best.
Now, that is a championship script, championship steel. It is that tenacity that saw him surge to Uganda’s first Olympic gold in 40 years, it is that determination that saw him become a world champion in Moscow; it is that unyielding spirit he will carry into the Beijing World Athletics Championships for his title defence later in August.
Yet the podium finish in Tokyo was still significant to Kiprotich in more ways than one. In setting his new personal best, Kiprotich also established the new national record (NR); erasing his previous one of 2:07:20, which he had set at the 2011 Enschede Marathon. Ending two hours of sweat and perseverance on the podium was just what Kiprotich, 26 on Friday, needed after he lost his daughter Elizabeth Chelangat, who succumbed to breathing complications early last month. It is said the runner dedicated the victory to his passed-on beloved.
Kiprotich may not have, rightly so, been pleased with just setting his new personal best and being second-best, but deep inside he will have appreciated the progress, especially knowing that it is the time factor that has cost him in previous marathons.
Prior to Sunday, some pundits still regarded him a slow marathoner, whose successes were only due to sheer luck.
But after improving his Personal Best (PB) by 47 seconds, Kiprotich proved to the world he can only get better.
He may not be fast enough to threaten the 2:02:57 world record but the Ugandan star now looks in shape to take on anyone. With about six months to the World Championships, the pretenders to his title have everything to worry about.
They will be facing a more polished runner, who is out to seal his place as Uganda’s greatest sportsman ever.
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