Kipyegon: Stage set for Kenya’s superstar to break another record in Monaco
By Joel Sang, June 24, 2023Faith Kipyegon will get a chance to break another record in 2023 when the Kenyan superstar takes part in the Herculis EBS Monaco Games on Friday, July 21, 2023.
It is a platform for the runner to try and register another record, but in a different discipline, after setting new world records both in the 1500m and 5000m on the Diamond League circuit in June.
Shattered world records
On the Florence Diamond League Circuit on Friday, June 2, in Italy, Kipyegon broke the 1500-meter world record and followed it with an even more staggering record in the 5000-meters in Paris, France, a week later. This made her the first athlete in Diamond League history to break the world record in two separate disciplines on the circuit.
She is on the list of participants for the Monaco games, and her entry was made possible following a change in schedule for Herculis EBS Monaco. She will be racing in the mile rather than the 1500m.
The points she collected from the Diamond League will go towards the 1500m qualification campaign, and the mile will present a new challenge for her. Kipyegon last ran the distance at a Diamond League meeting in Oslo in 2016.
The Monaco games to be held at Stade Louis II certainly have a world-record pedigree, where Kipyegon’s rival Sifan Hassan from the Netherlands made history there with 4:12.33 at the Monaco Diamond League four years ago.
Kipyegon remains the favourite to claim a third-world record in 2023.
In the 13 series of the Diamond League, athletes compete for points in a bid to qualify for the two-day Diamond League final in Eugene on September 16–17.
The Herculis EBS Meeting in Monaco is a land of middle-distance records, and it is also the venue for four current world records.
The women’s 1500m record of 3:50:07 was set by Ethiopian superstar Genzebe Dibaba in 2015, and the women’s 3,000m steeplechase record of 8:44:32 was set by Beatrice Chepkoech in 2018.
The women’s mile record of 4:12:33 was registered by Hassan in 2019, and the men’s record in 5,000 meters of 12:35:36 was set by Uganda’s legend Joshua Cheptegei in 2020.
The middle-distance events will be closely followed once again this year.
In the 1500-meter women’s category, Kipyegon is a regular on the track at the Stade Louis II, and the two-time world and Olympic champion put in an extraordinary performance in 2022. She crossed the line three-tenths off the world record for the distance (3:50:37).
Target in Monaco
The 29-year-old runner is set to be back with the aim of lowering her best world performance of the year (3:58:57), which she recorded in Doha in the first stage of the Diamond League.
The men’s 800 meters also attract considerable attention, with Kenya’s Emmanuel Korir having established himself as a force in the race.
He became the Olympic champion in 2021 and the world champion in Eugene, USA, last year, then postponed the Diamond League final the same year. He will be in Monaco to prepare himself before the World Championships on a track he knows well after running there in the last two editions (800m and 1000m).
The men’s 5,000m is going to be the highlight, as several big names are on the start line. World cross-country champion Jacob Kiplimo, who won bronze in the 5,000 meters at the last world championships, will hope to emerge victorious.
His runner-up from the world cross-country championships, Ethiopia’s Behiru Aregawi, world record-holder in the 5km and winner of the Diamond League in 2021 in the 5000m will join Kiplimo.
Jimmy Gressier of France is also set to attract some attention. He has always shone in Monaco, where he has twice beaten the European 5km record, in 2020 and 2023.