Kenya’s Gladys Cherono will be chasing her 4th title at this year’s Berlin Marathon set for 29th September in the Germany Capital.
Cherono, who holds the course record at 2:18.11 following her brace last year will be chasing her hat trick at the race when she won in 2017 clocking 2:20.23 before defending in 2018 with the course record.
The double Africa Athletics champion in 10,000m and 5,000m first won the title in 2015 in her second marathon race in 2:19.29 as she hopes to defend her title, breaking the jinx of all time comers on the course.
After finishing 4th at the 2018 London marathon, Cherono said she has been training and prepar8ing well for the race which is a fortnight away.
“It has been good all through in my training and am m ready, focused to defend my title,” said Cherono.
With her focus to keep her pace intact and acquire the best results on the course she is used to, Cherono saps 18km in her daily morning training before an easy 10km run in the evening.
Training in Iten, Elgeyo Marakwet county, Cherono is optimistic to improve on her time as she is working on it in her training sessions.
“For every athlete, running and improving on time is what we pray for. Going to Berlin, I need to improve on my time because I want to run by own race, chasing better time in a heavily competitive encounter” added the 2014 Africa 10,000m champion.
But she disputed the fact of going for a world record, a course that has been a harvesting point for world marathon breakers.
Eliud Kipchoge, Dennis Kimetto, Wilson Kipsang and Patrick Makau all broke marathon records on the course but that is not in the minds of Cherono, claiming that the world record will come when the right time comes.
“You can’t prepare for a world record. It only comes in at a given time. I will not be attempting it in Berlin because it is not as easy as many people may think,” said Cherono.