Former world cross country champion Gelete Burka will battle for honors at the 38th edition of Vienna City Marathon that will be held on 12, September in Vienna, Austria.
The Ethiopian who won the 2006 world cross country title is also credited with the 2015 World 10,000m silver medal.
According to the line-up released, Burka is the fastest on the course, enjoying her personal best of 2:20.45.
With her successful track career, the 35-years-old returned into the scene after four years of sabbatical leave with a bang improving on her time to 2:20.45 at the 2018 Dubai Marathon.
The Vienna City Marathon will now be the first marathon since 2019 and will be up against a strong field of perennial rivals Kenyans led by Risper Chebet who is the second fastest athlete on paper as she holds a personal best of 2:23.45 set during the 2021 Milan marathon.
The Burka and Chebet have been paired to try and lower the race course record of 2:22.12 that was set in 2019 by Nancy Kiprop who is also from Kenya.
Other Kenyans are Rebecca Kangogo and Celestine Chepchirchir with the former having her best time of 2:24.25 here when she was runner-up in 2017 while Chepchirchir was third in 2018 and the later enjoying a 2:24.48 set at the 2019 Seoul marathon.
The Vienna City Marathon organizers currently have registered a total of around 25,000 athletes. While this includes races at shorter distances there will be 6,000 marathon runners. Some of the events will take place on Saturday. The Vienna City Marathon is a World Athletics Marathon Label Road Race and will be the first major international marathon featuring a strong elite field and a mass race since the start of the Corona pandemic
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