{"id":82315,"date":"2023-02-01T15:52:02","date_gmt":"2023-02-01T15:52:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon"},"modified":"2023-02-01T16:25:53","modified_gmt":"2023-02-01T16:25:53","slug":"kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon","title":{"rendered":"Kipruto, Bekele to face off at London Marathon"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Kenya. <\/strong><\/span>Defending champion of the London Marathon Amos Kipruto will be up against the fastest man on the field Ethiopia&#8217;s Kenenisa Bekele, as he bids to retain his title on April 23.<\/p>\n<p>Kipruto will be in the company of 23-year-old compatriot Kelvin Kiptum, who produced the fastest marathon debut in history as he claimed victory in Valencia in December in 2:01:53.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI can\u2019t wait to return to London as the champion,\u201d said Kenya\u2019s Kipruto.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLondon always has a really strong field and this year is the same so I know I will face a battle to defend my title, but I\u2019m confident and looking forward to it,\u201d the 30-year-old added.<\/p>\n<p>The Ethiopians pose a threat to Kenya&#8217;s title chances. Bekele, the second fastest man in history behind two-time Olympic champion Eliud Kipchoge, will have world champion Tamirat Tola for company as well as Birhanu Legese and Mosinet Geremew.<\/p>\n<p>Both Ethiopians Legese (2:02:48) and Geremew (2:02:55) have also run under Kipruto\u2019s winning time of 2:04:39 last October. Two-time Berlin Marathon winner Bekele, runner-up in London in 2017, is considered one of the greatest distance runners of all time.<\/p>\n<p>However, the 40-year-old could only finish fifth at his fifth London Marathon last year. His personal best of two hours one minute 41 seconds is second only to Kipchoge.<\/p>\n<p>Kipchoge, the world record holder and a four-time winner in London, is absent from the line-up \u2014 instead targeting his Boston Marathon debut. Britain\u2019s four-time Olympic track champion Mo Farah will also compete as he prepares to say an \u201cemotional goodbye\u201d at the event.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <a href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\">Kenya<\/a> Follow <a href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/\">Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Kenya. Defending champion of the London Marathon Amos Kipruto will be up against the fastest man on the field Ethiopia&#8217;s Kenenisa Bekele, as he bids to retain his title on April 23. Kipruto will be in the company of 23-year-old compatriot Kelvin Kiptum, who produced the fastest marathon debut in history as he [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":82314,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,17],"tags":[6857,7003,544],"class_list":["post-82315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-sport","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-kenya","tag-kenya"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Kipruto, Bekele to face off at London Marathon - kenya<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Defending champion of the London Marathon Amos Kipruto will be up against the fastest man on the field Ethiopia&#039;s Keneni ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kipruto, Bekele to face off at London Marathon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Defending champion of the London Marathon Amos Kipruto will be up against the fastest man on the field Ethiopia&#039;s Keneni ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"kenya\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-02-01T15:52:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-02-01T16:25:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sites\/28\/2023\/02\/postQueueImg_1675254127.87.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"705\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Kipruto, Bekele to face off at London Marathon\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-02-01T15:52:02+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-02-01T16:25:53+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon\"},\"wordCount\":278,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sites\/28\/2023\/02\/postQueueImg_1675254127.87.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Kenya\",\"Kenya\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"sport\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/all-news\/kipruto-bekele-to-face-off-at-london-marathon\",\"name\":\"Kipruto, Bekele to face off at London Marathon - 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