Rosemary Monica Wanjiru (born 9 December 1994) is a Kenyan professional female

long-distance runner Long-distance running, or endurance running, is a form of continuous running over distances of at least . Physiologically, it is largely Aerobic exercise, aerobic in nature and requires endurance, stamina as well as mental strength. Within e ...

. She won the silver medal in the

5000 metres The 5000 metres or 5000-metre run is a common long-distance running event in track and field, approximately equivalent to or . It is one of the track events in the Olympic Games and the World Championships in Athletics, run over laps of a stan ...

at the

2015 African Games The 11th African Games took place from September 4–19, 2015 in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo. This edition marked the 50th anniversary of the Games, as well as their return to Brazzaville, which hosted the first edition in 1965. Host aw ...

, and represented her country at the

2019 World Athletics Championships The 2019 IAAF World Athletics Championships () was the seventeenth edition of the biennial, global athletics competition organised by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), since renamed World Athletics. It was held betw ...

, finishing fourth in the

10,000 metres The 10,000 metres or the 10,000-metre run is a common long-distance track running event. The event is part of the athletics programme at the Olympic Games and the World Athletics Championships, and is common at championship level events. The race ...

. Wanjiru won the 2023 Tokyo Marathon and placed second at the 2022 Berlin Marathon. With her Tokyo mark, she sits sixth on the

marathon The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair div ...

world all-time list. She achieved the second-fastest ever women's marathon debut at the time at the 2022 Berlin Marathon.

Career

Rosemary Wanjiru moved to Japan as a teenager and began competing in long-distance competitions there. She was runner-up in the

3000 metres The 3000 metres or 3000-metre run is a track running event, also commonly known as the "3K" or "3K run", where 7.5 laps are run around an outdoor 400 m track, or 15 laps around a 200 m indoor track. It is debated whether the 3000m shoul ...

at the 2012

National Sports Festival of Japan The is the national premier sports event of Japan. It consists of three stages. The skating and ice hockey stage takes place in January, the skiing stage takes place in February, and the main Autumn tournament takes place in September and Octob ...

, and won the national high schools championship over that distance the following year along with the Chiba International Cross Country title.Rosemary Monica Wanjiru
IAAF. Retrieved 2019-09-28. In 2014 she began competing in Corporate Japanese competitions for Team Starts. In her first year of corporate competition she was East Japan champion over

1500 metres The 1500 metres or 1,500-metre run (typically pronounced 'fifteen-hundred metres') is the foremost middle distance track event in athletics. The distance has been contested at the Summer Olympics since 1896 and the World Championships in Athletic ...

and 3000 m. She won the 2015 Sanyo Women's 10K and the 5000 m at the Japan Corporate Track and Field Championships, Oda Memorial and Nobeoka Golden Games.Rosemary-Monica Wanjiru

Association of Road Racing Statisticians The Association of Road Racing Statisticians is an independent, non-profit organization that collects, analyzes, and publishes statistics regarding road running races. The primary purpose of the ARRS is to maintain a valid list of world road record ...

. Retrieved 2019-09-28. Wanjiru made her international debut at the

and won a silver medal in the 5000 m, forming a Kenyan sweep of the medals alongside Margaret Chelimo and Alice Aprot. The year after she was beaten into second place at the Japan Corporate Championships by another Kenyan, Ann Karindi Mwangi. She repeated as champion at the Oda Memorial and Sanyo Women's 10K. In 2017 and 2018 she won both the Japan Corporate title and the Oda Memorial 5000 m. In 2019, Wanjiru began to compete more frequently outside of Japan. She won the

Lilac Bloomsday Run The Lilac Bloomsday Run, also known as Bloomsday, is an annual timed road race in the northwest United States, held on the first Sunday of May since 1977 in The course length is 12 km (7.456 mi). The run has had over 38,000 participants every ...

and

Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run The Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run is an annual 10-mile (16 km) road race in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1973 originally as a precursor training run for elite runners planning to compete in the Boston Marathon, the race has evolved over the y ...

in the United States before going on to place third in the 10,000 m at the

Kenyan Athletics Championships The Kenyan Athletics Championships is an annual track and field meeting which serves as Kenya's national championships for the sport. Athletics Kenya, the country's governing body for athletics organises the event. The championships is usually hel ...

. This earned her her second international selection for Kenya, this time at the

. At the World Championships she teamed up with compatriots Agnes Jebet Tirop and

Hellen Obiri Hellen Onsando Obiri (born 13 December 1989) is a Kenyan middle- and long-distance runner. She is a two-time Olympic 5000 metres silver medallist from the 2016 Rio and 2020 Tokyo Olympics, where she also placed fourth over the 10,000 metres. S ...

to lead the pace. She fell away from the leaders in the final stage of the race and ended the race in fourth place, behind

Sifan Hassan Sifan Hassan ( om, Siifan Hassan; born 1 January 1993) is an Ethiopian-born Dutch middle- and long-distance runner. She completed an unprecedented triple at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics winning gold medals in both the 5000 metres and 10,000 metres, ...

Letesenbet Gidey Letesenbet Gidey (Tigrinya: ለተሰንበት ግደይ, born 20 March 1998) is an Ethiopian long-distance runner who holds three world records plus one world best. A 10,000 metres 2020 Tokyo Olympic bronze medallist, at the World Athletics ...

and Tirop. In 2020, she competed in the women's half marathon at the 2020 World Athletics Half Marathon Championships held in Gdynia, Poland, placing 10th. Two years later, Wanjiru produced the second-fastest ever women's marathon debut at the

Berlin Marathon The Berlin Marathon (german: Berlin-Marathon, ) is a marathon event held annually on the streets of Berlin, Germany on the last weekend of September. Held annually since 1974, the event includes multiple races over the marathon distance of , inclu ...

with a time of 2:18:00. She went under the previous course record and finished second. In March 2023, Wanjiru won the

Tokyo Marathon The is an annual marathon sporting event in Tokyo, the capital of Japan. It is a World Athletics Platinum Label marathon and one of the six World Marathon Majors. The latest edition of the race took place on . It is sponsored by Tokyo Metro. H ...

with a 2:16:28 clocking, taking more than a minute and a half off her personal best to move up to sixth on the event's world all-time list. This was only the second marathon race of her career.

International competitions

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wanjiru, Rosemary 1994 births Living people Kenyan female long-distance runners Kenyan female cross country runners Athletes (track and field) at the 2015 African Games African Games silver medalists for Kenya World Athletics Championships athletes for Kenya African Games medalists in athletics (track and field) 21st-century Kenyan women

Career

International competitions

See also

References

External links