Kamworor to headline Copenhagen Half

Three-time world half marathon champion Geoffrey Kamworor will headline the Copenhagen Half Marathon on September 15.

Over the past five years or so, Kamworor has been absolutely dominant on the half marathon scene, a streak that began in Copenhagen, where he – a bit surprisingly – won his first world half marathon in 2014, victories he repeated in in 2016 and in Valencia two years after that.

In the interim, he also raced to world cross country triumphs in 2015 and 2017 making him one of the most dominant championship distance runners of the past decade.

The 26-year-old will return to the Danish capital on 15 September for the fifth edition of the Copenhagen Half Marathon with a clear mission: to run fast.

“Over these past few years, Kamworor has become the biggest name in the world of running, if we leave the marathon distance out of account,” said Henrik Paulsen, director of Sports at Sparta, the club that organises the race.

“His achievements speak for themselves. The only thing missing on his resume now is probably a world record. Therefore we are very excited that he has announced that he will be coming to Copenhagen to achievement a fast time.”

Kamworor was pre-race favourite at the IAAF World Cross Country Championships Aarhus 2019 in Denmark in March.

He had to settle for third at that occasion, but in May he once again clearly demonstrated his current strength when winning a ten-mile road race in Bern, Switzerland, clocking 44:57 to become the 11th fastest to ever cover the distance.

“Apart from the CPH Half, Kamworor will also be lining up for this year’s New York Marathon.

“These two competitions are top priorities to him, so we should expect to see Kamworor in super shape and with the capacity to run really fast.

“This was evident at the world half marathon championships in Valencia last year, where he ran the last 5 kilometres in 12:58, which is just insanely fast,” Paulsen said.

The race record is 58:40 set by Bahrain’s Abraham Cheroben in 2017.