Shortly before the prize ceremony at the Graz marathon I had the opportunity to talk to the winner of the marathon: Henry Kapkyai.
With 2:13:19 the Kenian did the second best time ever run in the Graz marathon. At the same time this was his personal best. Allthought Henry Kapkyai is with 22 years still quite a young runner, he already run a view marathons: At last years Krakau marathon he stood first (2:16:52), in Oostende second (2:13:38) and in march of this year fourth at the Treviso marathon (2:14:20). Here in Graz he celebrated his second big victory.
"How was the marathon" I asked. "Very tough, but also very nice" was the prompt answer. Up to kilometer 30 Henry was keeping quite in the back of the leading group and suddenly he left the others behind. At the end he was leading more then one minute ahead of Richard Mutai (2:14:34) and Bellor Yator (2:14:35).
I wanted to know how much he is training per week. "70 kilometers may be 100", for me a very astounding statement. Perhaps he was just talking of the fast kilometers, because it is known that Kenian runners run up to 240 kilometers per week.
Henry is trained by the most famous Italian coach Renato Canova. Canova already made many unknown athletes to top runners, among them: twice world champion Stephen Cherono, who is running for Katar under the name of Saif Saaeed Shaheen (obstacles world champion 2003 and 2005), 3000 meter obstacles world champion Dorcus Inzikuru, Berlin marathon winner Philip Manyim, New York City and Boston marathon winner Rodgers Rop, to name just a view. It is clear that whit such a coach there are more improvements to be expected for Henry.
Next year, he assured me, he will participate in a bigger marathon. Also he was considering to start again in Graz. But this will be decided alone by his coach. "Will you run under 2:10" I asked. He answered me "May be". Here our talk ended, because Henry had to go to the prize ceremony.
I am sure we will hear a lot in the future about this still young talented Kenian.
Roby Schiltz
With 2:13:19 the Kenian did the second best time ever run in the Graz marathon. At the same time this was his personal best. Allthought Henry Kapkyai is with 22 years still quite a young runner, he already run a view marathons: At last years Krakau marathon he stood first (2:16:52), in Oostende second (2:13:38) and in march of this year fourth at the Treviso marathon (2:14:20). Here in Graz he celebrated his second big victory.
"How was the marathon" I asked. "Very tough, but also very nice" was the prompt answer. Up to kilometer 30 Henry was keeping quite in the back of the leading group and suddenly he left the others behind. At the end he was leading more then one minute ahead of Richard Mutai (2:14:34) and Bellor Yator (2:14:35).
I wanted to know how much he is training per week. "70 kilometers may be 100", for me a very astounding statement. Perhaps he was just talking of the fast kilometers, because it is known that Kenian runners run up to 240 kilometers per week.
Henry is trained by the most famous Italian coach Renato Canova. Canova already made many unknown athletes to top runners, among them: twice world champion Stephen Cherono, who is running for Katar under the name of Saif Saaeed Shaheen (obstacles world champion 2003 and 2005), 3000 meter obstacles world champion Dorcus Inzikuru, Berlin marathon winner Philip Manyim, New York City and Boston marathon winner Rodgers Rop, to name just a view. It is clear that whit such a coach there are more improvements to be expected for Henry.
Next year, he assured me, he will participate in a bigger marathon. Also he was considering to start again in Graz. But this will be decided alone by his coach. "Will you run under 2:10" I asked. He answered me "May be". Here our talk ended, because Henry had to go to the prize ceremony.
I am sure we will hear a lot in the future about this still young talented Kenian.
Roby Schiltz