Marathon elite ready for tomorrow

The big highlight of the Salzburg Running Festival is getting closer and closer. On the occasion of tomorrow's marathon competition, the runners favored for the main competition met this morning for a joint press event. In addition to the men's favourite, Peter Wangari (Kenya), Carinthian Edwin Kemboi would also like to have a say in the victory tomorrow. The Kenyans Wesley Kemboi, William Koskei and Amos Kipruto are also expected to be in the top flight. For the women, there could be a duel between Karin Freitag from Tyrol and Teresia Omosa from Kenya.

Well prepared for Friday and Kemboi

Of course, the preparation completed in the weeks and months beforehand is decisive for a top performance at the Salzburg Marathon. For the four-time marathon state champion Karin Freitag, this looked a little different this year than in previous years. "I invested more time in calmer, slower runs and didn't compete as much in preparation," said Freitag. Her goal for Sunday is to “run in the area of my personal best” – a target time between 2:42:00 and 2:43:00.

Edwin Kemboi's preparation didn't go as planned. The Carinthian was able to demonstrate his good form at the half marathon in Verona this year. Because of the flu in the run-up to the Salzburg marathon, improving the personal best (2:12:58) will be rather difficult here. "My goal for tomorrow is a time under 2:20:00," said Kemboi. In order to qualify for the European Championship marathon in August in Berlin, the ÖLV limit of 2:17:00 has to be beaten.

ÖLV State Championships at the Salzburg Marathon 

Apart from the prestigious overall victory in the Salzburg marathon, the national championship titles in marathon running will also be awarded on Sunday. Both Freitag and Kemboi are traded as favourites. The experienced Tyrolean even has the chance tomorrow to win her fifth state championship title and thus become the sole Austrian record holder.