(Kaptagat) When young Eliud Kipchoge got into athletics in the early 2000s, he wanted to “just get on a plane and go to Europe.” Twenty-two years later, he is a living marathon legend who arrives in Paris for a Games that looks like the ultimate challenge.
At 39, the Kenyan wants to make history on August 11 by becoming “the first human to win three times in a row” the Olympic marathon, overtaking the Ethiopian Abebe Bikila (1960, 1964) and the German Waldemar Cierpinski (1976, 1980).
It was in Paris on August 31, 2003 that the then 18-year-old athlete made a thunderous entrance into the international arena, becoming world champion in the 5000m ahead of the two big favorites Hicham El Guerrouj and Kenenisa Bekele.
This first big title will be his only one on the track.
PHOTO GABRIEL BOUYS, ARCHIVES AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Eliud Kipchoge, in 2003
It was on the road, which he embarked on after failing to qualify for the London Games in 2012, that he would achieve glory.
With his ample and metronomic stride, he twice broke the marathon world record (2018, 2022). He is now the only man to have covered the 42.195 km in less than two hours, during an unsanctioned race organized by his sponsor in 2019.
He has won 16 of the 20 official marathons he has run since 2013, with, in addition to his two Olympic titles (2016, 2021), eleven victories in the “Majors” (five in Berlin, four in London, one each in Tokyo and Chicago).
” Determined “
The youngest of four siblings, raised by his mother, a nursery school teacher (his father died when he was a baby) in the village of Kapsisiywa, in the foothills of the Rift Valley, young Eliud loved to run.
“Running is normal in our community, we run to school, to the shopping centre…” he tells AFP.
He tried his luck in athletics, “but it wasn’t with the goal of becoming a great runner,” he continues: “I just wanted to get on a plane and go to Europe. I didn’t know that being an athlete could feed my family, my brothers and sisters.”
As a teenager, he often ran into a neighbour he had seen on television during training: the vice-world champion (1991, 1993) and vice-Olympic champion (1992) in the 3000m steeplechase, Patrick Sang.
In 2001, he approached him and asked him for a training program. Patrick Sang scribbled one on his arm.
“He came back regularly for more,” says the former runner, 20 years his senior: “At the time, I couldn’t say that this guy had anything special. But in retrospect […] I can say that he was someone who knew where he wanted to go. He was really determined.”
The two men would never leave each other again, developing an almost filial relationship.
Reading, football, UFC
A tireless worker, recording every training session in notebooks, Eliud Kipchoge dedicated his life to running.
Since 2002, he has lived “nine months” a year at the camp of the athlete management agency Global Sports Communications in Kaptagat, a village in western Kenya at an altitude of 2,500 m.
Waking up early in the morning, shopping, meals and rest punctuate his monastic existence. On weekends he meets up with his wife and three children who live in the neighbouring town of Eldoret.
This lifestyle contrasts with his income estimated at several million dollars, the fruit of his victories and records, but also of partnerships (Nike, INEOS, Maurten, Isuzu, etc.).
True to his land-based roots, Kipchoge also owns a dairy and maize farm in the Eldoret region and a tea plantation in his home region.
His taste for reading (Paulo Coelho, Stephen Covey, etc.) and maxims, as well as his phlegm, earned him the nickname “philosopher”.
He is also a sports enthusiast, a supporter of Tottenham football club, and a fan of Formula 1, Moto GP, boxing and mixed martial arts – two sports in which he sees parallels with marathon running. “These people train for six months for a 15-minute fight. And they can be knocked out in seconds.”
Death threats
Marathon runner Kipchoge has had little experience of failure. His recent poor performances in Boston last year (6e) and Tokyo (10e) in March were all the more striking.
“In Tokyo I spent three days without sleeping,” he told the BBC in May, referring to death threats on social media.
Conspiracy theories have accused him of being involved in the death of Kelvin Kiptum, the new marathon prodigy who died in February in a car accident near the Kaptagat camp.
“I received a lot of bad things: that the camp would be burned, that my investments in the city would be burned, that my house would be burned, that my family would be burned,” he said, struggling to hold back tears. He said he lost “about 90 percent” of his friends.
Deeply affected by this ordeal, the man who is used to repeating that “the marathon is life, with ups and downs, sometimes you are tired, you hit rock bottom, you start again” is now facing his ambition.
“It’s his dream to make history,” says Patrick Sang. Even though, according to him, history has already been written: “Look how many years he’s been at the top, more than 20 years. That’s already history.”