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| Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir |
Reigning Olympic Marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir will be attempting to make history at the New York City Marathon on Sunday.Peres will be trying to win a major marathon race after Olympic marathon title.
No woman Olympic marathon champion has won a post Olympic marathon race in that same year and Peres will be going into the books of history if she tops the podium on Sunday.It has been 50 years since when a male Olympic marathon champion won a post-olympic fall marathon and that is Franks Shorter of America who won the 1972 Munich Olympics Marathon and went ahead to win Fukuoka marathon 12 weeks later after winning Olympic race.
Historically, it has been difficult for women marathoners and Peres Will be competing after she won Olympic marathon race 13 weeks ago.Constantina Dita of Romania who won the 2008 Beijing women's Olympics Marathon finished fourth at the 2008 Chicago marathon being the only woman Olympic marathon champion that has ever come close to the podium after in a post-olympic fall marathon.
During a press conference at Central Park, Peres told reporters that she is well prepared for the race.
"I knew after Olympics I was coming to New York and I have been training for this race.It will not be easy but I am prepared,"Jepchirchir said.
Jepchirchir, twice the world half-marathon champion and the World Athletics record holder for that distance for a women's-only race, ran a superb race at the Olympic Marathon in Sapporo on a hot, humid, and sunny day.
She ran the first half with the main pack of 11 contenders in a conservative 1:15:14. She dropped her pace in the second half, and systematically burned off all of her rivals except teammate Brigid Kosgei by the 40kilometre mark.
She left Kosgei in the final two kilometers to win by 16 seconds in 2:27:20 and became just the second Kenyan woman to win the Olympic Marathon title since the event was added to The Games in 1984 in Los Angeles.
She'll be running in crisp, fall weather on Sunday, but without the long months of preparation she put in before her Olympic race. She explained that she felt the weight of running for her country in the Olympics and took her time in training to build up slowly.
With just less than 100 days between marathons, Jepchirchir had to shorten her marathon build-up for New York.There, she conferred with her mentor and adidas teammate, Mary Keitany, the four-time New York City Marathon champion who was under the same management as Jepchirchir before she retired earlier this year.Jepchirchir once ran as a pacemaker for Keitany at the 2015 London Marathon.
Again, no marathon Olympic champion has won TCS New York City Marathon.American Frank Shorter, who won the gold medal in Münich in 1972 and the silver medal in 1976, finished second in New York in 1976, did not finish in 1977, was 12th in 1978, and seventh in 1979. Italian Stefano Baldini won the Olympic Marathon in Athens in 2004, then placed sixth in New York in 2006 and fourth in 2007. Stephen Kiprotich of Uganda, the 2012 Olympic champion, finished 12th in New York in 2013 and fifth in 2014. Joan Benoit Samuelson, winner of the inaugural Olympic Marathon for women in Los Angeles in 1984, finished third in 1988 and sixth in 1991. In the 1988 race Samuelson was tripped by a boy handing out cups of water which sent her tumbling to the pavement near the 21-mile mark.
Jepchirchir has an excellent chance of breaking the "Olympic Curse" in this year's race.
