Stephen Kiprotich Video Before 2013 ING New York City Marathon

by: LetsRun.com
October 31, 2013

The Olympic and World Champ Stephen Kiprotich addressed the media Thursday.

His rival for the $500,000 WMM majors prize also addressed the media as well. To see our article on Kebede, go here: Tsegaye Kebede Ready For 2013 New York City Marathon. Race Results Weekly has an article on Stephen and his battle with Tsegaye Kebede for the $500,000 World Marathon Major crown here.

The most interesting thing we learned was that Stephen said is he did not want to run the Moscow World Championships, but the Ugandan federation urged him to do it, so he ran. Stephen said, “I did not expect to win gold,” but that’s exactly what he did in Moscow to go along with his London gold. Even more impressive was that Stephen’s youngest daughter who is now four months old, was in the hospital just prior to him going to Worlds. She had pneumonia like symptoms and now because of that the rest of his family lives at low altitude while Stephen trains at high altitude.

Stephen said all along he wanted to focus the back half of 2013 on New York City. The hilly and presumably slower New York course suits him well as the one thing the Olympic and World champ has not done is run fast. Stephen’s PR is still his 2:07:20 from his first marathon in Enschede, Netherlands.

On not running fast, Stephen said, “So many people ask me, whenever I won the big competitions like Moscow, London, people want the big times. And I start fearing, I keep saying, I can’t run 2:03. But people say, if you can win Olympics, 2:07 is not your personal best. Maybe you can run a 2:05.”

Video below. The audio improves after the first few minutes.

More: Stephen Kiprotich, Tsegaye Kebede Ready to Duel for World Marathon Majors Title