Vibian Chepkirui eyes historic third victory at 2025 Vienna City Marathon

ibian Chepkirui (Photo: courtesy)

By Erick Kariuki
Wednesday, February 19, 2025

The 30-year-old, fresh from winning the Kapsabet 15km Road Race, boasts outstanding performances on Austrian soil in 2021 and 2022.

Kenya’s Vibian Chepkirui will make a comeback at the 40th edition of the Vienna City Marathon, a World Athletics Elite Label Race, slated for April 06, 2025, in Vienna, Austria.

The 30-year-old, fresh from winning the Kapsabet 15km Road Race, boasts outstanding performances on Austrian soil in 2021 and 2022. She won her debut marathon, then shattered the course record with a time of 2:20:59, a mark that still stands. As she returns, aiming for a third consecutive victory, this record could be under threat.

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"The 30-year-old, who is just fresh from winning the Kapsabet 15km Road Race, produced two extraordinary performances in the Austrian capital in 2021 and 2022: First, she won her debut marathon, and then she broke the course record with a time of 2:20:59. This time still stands and could well be attacked when she returns with the aim of making it three victories out of three starts," as seen on the Athletics News site.

Chepkirui will face challenges as she strives to surpass her peers, including Rebecca Tanui, Catherine Cherotich, and Faith Chepkoech.

A year ago, Tanui finished third in Vienna before winning the Kosice Marathon with a course record of 2:21:08. In 2024, Catherine Cherotich had a breakthrough year, improving her marathon personal best by nearly 16 minutes to finish fourth in Frankfurt with 2:22:42 in October.

Faith Chepkoech made a surprising impact in her second international race, and first outside Africa, at last year's Vienna City Marathon, finishing second with 2:26:22, an improvement of over 16 minutes. After placing seventh at the Cape Town Marathon last autumn with 2:28:00, it will not be easy for Chepkirui, as the trio will be looking to upset her in the race.

This year's race surpasses the number of registered athletes from the previous one. There were 11,000 registered marathon runners last year, but for this coming race, there will be over 40,000 athletes competing across various distances throughout the first weekend of April.

"We are witnessing a running boom in the whole of Europe, and for us in Vienna, it is great to see that many young people and women take up running and enter our events," said Dominik Konrad, who is the joint General Manager of the Vienna City Marathon together with Kathrin Widu.

"We are really happy that we have a record entry in the marathon since this is, of course, the heartbeat of our whole event," said Widu, as seen on the Athletics News site.