Image: courtesy
Every person who is good at something has a story to tell of their journey and Faith Kipyegon, the current world record holder for the 1500 metres and mile both set in 2023 is no different.
From running barefoot at a world championship to breaking world records. It has been a stellar rise for her.
Narrating her journey on Wednesday night, her first breakthrough was winning the 2011 World Cross Country junior race.
Later, she went on to win the junior race again in 2013 in Bydgoszcz.
Kipyegon said her passion for running started when she was in Primary school in Nakuru county.
"My journey began a long time ago in Chebara Primary School. I used to run to and from school barefoot…ukipata ile barafu iko huko chini ya mto unaskia moto ( when you find the ice at the river, you feel heat)," she said during an interview at Citizen TV.
She said that she discovered she could run during the school games that used to take place after classes in the evening where they used to run for even two kilometres.
Kipyegon later joined another school where she found someone who helped her practice more and that's where it began.
While in school, Kipyegon said she used to enjoy gymnastics a lot but her passion and interest in athletics grew more when she started going to school competitions. She could resist.
"I used to run 400 metres to 10, 000 metres and I was good because I used to defeat other students.
Going further, Kipyego says it was not always perfect as she had difficulty adapting to running track races with spikes. She was used to barefoot as she felt it was more comfortable.
Track spikes, or just spikes, are a type of footwear featuring protruding spikes on the soles used by athletes when racing on the track. Some spikes are designed for longer-term training on tracks.
"I was comfortable and used to running barefooted. When I started using tracks I began with four pins and later upgraded to six. Now I’m comfortable in them," Kipyegon explained.
Kipyegon won her specialist event at the 2011 World Under-18 Championships, and 2012 World U20 Championships.
At the age of 18, she did not reach the semifinals of the 2012 London Olympics, but won the junior races at the 2011 and 2013 World Cross Country Championships, and finished fifth at the 2013 World Championships.
She participated in the 2014 Commonwealth Games champion and was a three-time Diamond League winner.
At the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Kipyegon won a gold medal in the 1500 m.s.
Kipyegon is a two-time world champion from 2017 and 2022 as well as a two-time world silver medallist from 2015, when she lost only to the multiple world record-holder Genzebe Dibaba, and 2019, when she lost only to the multiple world record-holder Sifan Hassan.
In August 2022, Kipyegon achieved the second-fastest time in history, setting her consecutive Kenyan record.
She was born on January 10, 1994, in a family of eight siblings.
Kipyegon’s husband is Timothy Kiptum, who is a 2012 Olympics 800m bronze medalist and together they have one child.
