Three days after her 25th birthday Betty Chepkemoi celebrated her first major triumph in road running and her biggest career win at the Vienna City Marathon.
In ice cold weather conditions the Kenyan smashed her personal best by over ten minutes, improving her debut time of 2:34:52 from Istanbul last year to 2:24:14. She had been the second slowest runner on Vienna’s elite start list and was never considered as a favourite.
There was another woman behind her who caused a surprise: Germany’s Fabienne Königstein took fourth place and achieved her best position in a major international marathon.
“I never ran in such cold conditions before. With regard to this I am really happy as it is quite an impressive personal best,“ said Betty Chepkemoi, who grew up in Narok County in high altitude. “I loved to run as a child, running has always been my passion. I properly started at the age of 14 when I was at primary school.“
As a youngster she was inspired by Kenyan middle and long distance track stars Janeth Jepkosgei, Mercy Cherono and Hellen Obiri, who moved up to the marathon and won the Olympic bronze medal last year.
Betty Chepkemoi, who moved to Bomet County when she married but trains in Kapsabet, is a member of the successful training group coached by Italian Claudio Berardelli. Originally a steeplechaser she switched to road running in 2021 and had immediate success.
Running her half marathon debut she took second place in the Rome Ostia race with a time of 66:37 that still stands as her personal best. In the following years she could not build on that performance.
“The reason was that I had to do a nine months military training in 2022. In the following year I came back but it took a while to catch up. Then I ran my marathon debut last November in Istanbul,“ explains Chepkemoi.
Victory at the Vienna City Marathon strengthens her ultimate dream: running the Olympic marathon. “I know that I will have to run considerably faster to achieve this. But it is possible,“ said Betty Chepkemoi.
There was another woman in the elite field who achieved unexpected success in Sunday’s race: Germany’s Fabienne Königstein finished fourth in 2:28:49. The 32 year-old achieved something quite remarkable since it was her second marathon within a month in which she ran such a time. Four weeks earlier she clocked 2:28:20 in Nagoya.
Coming back from a long period with injuries the German, who has a 2:25:48 PB from Hamburg in 2023 and was eleventh at the European Championships in 2018, had not returned to full marathon training before Nagoya and then felt fresh enough to run a second race.
“I am really happy with my performance and looking to an autumn marathon I can now build well on these two races,“ said Königstein. “I am free of injuries and healthy, enjoying my running.“
It was actually the Vienna City Marathon that played a decisive role when Fabienne Königstein decided to run her marathon debut in 2017. She ran the half marathon, which is staged parallel in Vienna, in that year and won the race in 1:16:45.
“I got a very good impression about elite races in a major city marathon. And after that there was a desire to try a marathon myself.“ Half a year later Königstein ran a 2:34:14 debut in Berlin.
